Chapter Five.

Chapter Five.Our Kite-Race.Towards the end of April, the rising sun ushered in a fine breezy morning, with every promise of a strong wind during the day. It was a half-holiday; but on grand occasions of the sort—for it was the day fixed for the kite-race—the boys were allowed to get up and begin lessons an hour earlier than usual. The Doctor always encouraged early rising, and he was, besides, anxious to show us that he took an interest in our amusements, by making such regulations as might facilitate them.Ernest and Ellis had constantly been to old Hobson’s to see how their carriage was getting on. “Never you mind, young gen’men, it’s all right,” was his answer for some days. “I won’t disappoint you; but you see several has come here who wants such fine painted affairs, that I must get on with them. There’s Mr Blackall, now, who has been and ordered a carriage which I tells him will take six horses to drag; but he says that he has got a kite coming which will pull one along ten miles an hour, twice as big as this, so of course I’ve nothing more to say.”A large flat case arrived in the morning of the race day for Blackall, just as we were going in to lessons after breakfast; so he had no time to open it. It was not as large as he expected, but still he was very confident that all was right.Lessons over, we went in to dinner—and that meal got through, with more speed than usual, we all assembled to see the kites and the carriages which had been prepared.The carpenters were in attendance with the vehicles they had got ready according to orders received. They were of all shapes and plans. Several, among whom was Blackall’s, were very finely painted, but the greater number were mere boxes on wheels, put together at very little expense—which few boys were able to afford, even when clubbing together.First appeared Monsieur Malin’s kite; it represented a wonderful Green Dragon, twisting and turning about in the most extraordinary way—the tail of the kite being merely the small end of the tail of the dragon. It had great big red eyes, glowing with tinsel, and wings glittering all over, and a tongue which looked capable of doing a large amount of mischief. Loud shouts of applause welcomed the green dragon, as Monsieur Malin held it up like a shield before him, and moved about the playground, hissing, and howling, and making all sorts of dreadful noises.Tommy Bouldon had joined a club, which produced a magnificent Owl, with a large head, and huge goggling eyes; and never did owl hiss more loudly than did their owl as it met Monsieur Malin’s terrific dragon. They at last rushed at each other with such fury, that Tommy’s head very nearly went through the owl’s body, which would effectually have prevented it from flying at the match.Lemon and Buttar had fraternised, and in front of them marched a Military Officer, magnificent in a red coat, vast gold epaulets, and no end of gold braiding and trimming, which glittered finely in the sun, while his richly ornamented cocked hat, set across his head, had on the top of it a waving plume of feathers, and a drawn sword in his hand shone in the sunbeams. He looked very fiercely at the dragon and the owl, as he did at everybody, for his eyes were large, and round, and dark.The Dragon roared, and the Owl hissed at him, when he growled out, “I’ll eat you,” which produced loud shouts of laughter from both of them, while they quietly replied, “You can’t.”After the General had shown himself, Ellis walked in, bearing a long thin pole, wrapped round, it appeared, by a flag. Ernest accompanied him, carrying a reel of fine but very strong twine. Some boys stared, and others laughed derisively, and asked if he thought that thing was going to fly. “You’ll see—you’ll see,” he answered very quietly.“Fly!—Dat it will—higher dan any of ours, I tell you, boys,” observed Monsieur Malin, who had eyed it attentively.Ernest and Ellis marched across the playground, into the field beyond, out of sight, and in less than two minutes returned, bearing aloft a magnificent Knight in silver armour, with a glittering shield on his arm, a plume on his helmet, and a spear in his hand. His visor was up, and his countenance, with a fine black beard and moustache, looked forth fiercely beneath it, while a band of roses, which was thrown over his shoulder, hung down and formed a very magnificent tail, glittering with jewels. No sooner did the gallant knight make his appearance than the derisive laughter and sneers were changed into shouts of applause. All were agreed that never had a more beautiful kite appeared.“All very well,” cried Dawson, who was expecting Blackall’s kite to come forth, “but it is a question with me whether such a gimcrack-looking affair will fly.”Blackall had meantime been busily employed in unpacking his kite, which was to create so much astonishment, and do such mighty things. He undid the strings and brown paper, and laths, which surrounded it, with eager haste. A number of boys were looking on, all curious to see what was to be produced. Dawson was among the most sanguine, expecting that something very fine was to appear. At last Blackall was seen to scratch his head, and to look somewhat annoyed.“Come, come, Blackall,” exclaimed Sandford, one of the biggest fellows, and certainly no friend of his; “let us see this precious kite of yours. Out with it, man.”“Mind your own business, Sandford,” answered the bully, sulkily. “I’ll show the kite when I feel inclined.”“Ho, ho, ho!” replied Sandford, laughing; and knowing perfectly well that Blackall dared not retaliate, stooping down, he lifted the kite, and held it up to the view of the whole school. There was a picture of a big ugly boy daubed in the commonest ochre, and bearing evident marks of its toy-shop origin, though Tommy Bouldon and others declared that they recognised in it a strong likeness to Blackall himself. Blackall seemed to think that some trick had been played him, though it was very clear that the likeness was accidental.“It’s pretty plain who’s got the ugliest and most stupid looking kite,” said Buttar, as he passed by. “Very like himself. I wonder if it will fly.”“Yes, if it can find a small kite up in the sky to thrash,” observed Bouldon. “But, I say, let us give three cheers for Blackall’s toy-shop kite. I wonder if he will take it as a compliment.”A boisterous, if not a hearty, cheer was quickly raised, which barely served to cover a chorus of hisses and groans uttered by a number of little fellows, who had been in the habit of receiving gratuitous kicks and cuffs from their amicable companion.There were several ordinary kites, remarkable chiefly for their size, being made of newspapers; but there were others contributing an ingenious variety of devices—bats, and frogs, and fish of curious shapes. The flying-fish especially looked very natural as they glittered in the sunbeams, only people could not help inquiring how they came to be up so high in the air.At last all were ready to set forth; some pushed the carriages, and others carried the kites. Ernest and Ellis rolled up theirs, and carried it along very easily. The Doctor led the way, accompanied by two or three of the biggest fellows; but he would every now and then stop, and call up some of the smaller ones to have a talk with them.The ground chosen for the trial of the kites was a high, downy table-land, with a fine flat surface. It was a very pretty sight to see all the boys, with their carriages and gaily-coloured kites, assembled together. There were nearly fifty kites, for many brought small kites, with which they had no intention to contend for a prize. All the masters, and several friends of the Doctor’s and some of the boys, attended to act as umpires. At last everything was arranged.The kite-flyers formed one long line, with the wind in their backs. The first point to be decided was the beauty of the kites. Lemon had his horn, which was to be used as a signal. He blew three shrill blasts. At the sound of the third, up they all flew, some starting rapidly upwards; others wavering about before ascending; a few refusing to mount altogether beyond a few yards off the ground. However, the greater number mounted rapidly, their brilliant colours flashing in the sunbeams. The spectators clapped their hands loudly, as a mark of their approbation, and then set to work to make notes, that they might decide when called on to declare on whom the prizes ought to be bestowed.Monsieur Malin’s Green Dragon came in for a large share of praise, so did the General Officer; but Ellis’s Knight of the Silver Shield was decided to be the most elegant and beautiful of all the kites, and the owner was called forth to receive his meed of applause.Many were surprised when they saw Ellis, with his awkward gait, shuffling out from among the crowd; and, more especially, when he announced himself, in a hesitating tone, not only as the maker, but as the designer of the Knight of the Silver Shield.One kite went up some way, just sufficient to exhibit its ugliness, but wavered and rolled about in the most extraordinary manner, evidently showing that it was lop-sided. It received shouts, but they were not of applause, and they were accompanied by hisses, which the Doctor, however, repressed. The kite received in this unflattering way was Blackall’s boasted toy-shop production. He was highly indignant, and walked about stamping with rage.Buttar and Bouldon were much amused, and expressed a hope that he would expend his fury on his kite, and cut it to pieces. He drew out his knife, evidently with that intention, but he had not the heart to attack it.“I’ll tell you what it is, Bobby,” said he to Dawson, who was standing by not a little disgusted, “it pulls terrifically hard, and in my opinion, if it is altered a little, and has a heavier wing put on the right side, it will yet do magnificently, and make all those howling monkeys change their tone. That dolt Ellis, and that conceited chap Bracebridge, will soon find that their finely-bedizened machine is cut out. My carriage is, I know, such a first-rate one, that it will go along with anything.”Dawson was in great hopes that Blackall was right, for he had staked his reputation, as he said, on the success of his patron and his imported kite, and he had no fancy to find himself laughed at. In what Master Bobby Dawson’s reputation consisted he did not stop to inquire, and certainly anybody else would have been very puzzled to say.The rest of the kite-flyers troubled themselves very little about Blackall and his ill success. They were all intent on making their own kites perform their best. After the kites had flown for some time, the Doctor advanced from the group of spectators and umpires, and summoned Ellis and Monsieur Malin, and, with an appropriate address, bestowed on them the two first prizes, complimenting them on their design, and the beauty of the execution.And now the time arrived to try which kites could fly the highest. All were hauled in, and the boys stood as before in a row. The signal was given by Lemon, and up they went, soaring far away into the blue sky. This time Ernest had a kite as well as Ellis. It was a good large kite, with remarkably strong string. The device was that of a man-at-arms, with a gleaming battle-axe over his shoulder, or, as Ernest called it, the Squire.“Why, Bracebridge! what do you expect that kite to do, eh?” exclaimed Lemon. “It is too heavy-looking to fly, and not large enough to drag a carriage.”“I hope that at all events he will do his duty, and prove a faithful Squire,” answered Bracebridge.“I wonder what he means?” said several boys who overheard him.Away soared the kites; some of them appeared as if they would never come down again. The Green Dragon rose very high, and must have astonished the birds and beasts of the field, if it did not the human beings in the valley below. The Silver Knight also played his part well up in the skies, so did the General, and many others. Up, up went the Green Dragon, and high soared the Silver Knight; Excelsior was his motto; but high as he went, the Green Dragon went higher.“Hilloa, Bracebridge, you and your friend should have chosen a different motto for your knight, for the Green Dragon is beating him, and the old Owl is not far behind,” exclaimed Lemon, who, while manoeuvring his kite, found himself not far from Ernest.“Stay a bit,” answered Ernest, in a good-natured tone; “perhaps our knight may yet prove that his motto was not ill-chosen. We have not yet got to the end of our line.”Monsieur Malin kept easing out his line, and his monster went slowly upward, but it was evident that the weight of string it had already to bear was almost too much for it, and that it would not carry much more. It was a brave dragon, however, and in the French master’s skilful hands, it is extraordinary how high it got up. At last it was evident that it was stationary, and required a great deal of manoeuvring to be kept at the height it had attained.“Now, Bracebridge,” cried Ellis, who had worked the Silver Knight up almost as high, “let me have your line.”“All right,” answered Bracebridge, hauling down his kite till it was within thirty feet of the ground. “Hook on.”On this Ellis brought the end of his line up to Bracebridge, who fastened it to the string of the Squire, which immediately shot upward, while higher and higher flew the Silver Knight. He reached the Green Dragon, and floated proudly past him. Up he went, higher and higher, till a glittering spot could alone be seen in the blue heavens. Shouts of applause broke from the spectators.“Now,” cried Bracebridge triumphantly, “has not our knight chosen his motto with judgment, Excelsior? See, up he goes higher and higher.”Higher he did go, indeed; and in a short time the glittering spot was lost to view.“We could easily get our Squire out of sight also, if we could find a line light enough and strong enough to bear the strain of the two kites together, but no string we have got here could bear the strain that would be put upon it,” observed Ernest to those who came round to observe the wonder which had been wrought.Some declared that it was not fair, and that they had no right to fasten the string of one kite to that of another.“Oh! that’s all nonsense, and you fellows know it well,” answered Ernest. “The question to be decided is, which kite can reach the farthest from the earth, and ours has done so. Unless another gets higher, we shall win the prize.”No other kite got even so high as the Green Dragon, so the Silver Knight was most justly declared to be the winner of the prize.“Froggy Malin’s and those fellows’ kites may fly high, but they will not be able to pull anything along,” growled out Blackall. “Before they think that they are going to carry off all the prizes, let us see what my kite can do. He looks like a strong, tough fellow, who can pull hard at all events.”Dawson and a few of Blackall’s admirers echoed these sentiments, fully believing that he did not boast without reason of what he would do.The carriages were now brought forward from a chalk-pit, where they had been concealed, and formed a line in front of the spectators. Blackall’s was certainly the largest, and not the least gay and gaudy, but more than one person smiled at the notion of its being dragged along by a single kite. None of the carriages could boast of much beauty, but some were very finely painted, and were admired accordingly. When Ernest brought out his vehicle, it was much laughed at, for it had such an odd, spider-like, skeleton look. Still the knowing ones acknowledged that it might have a great deal of go in it.Most of the line of the kites was now hauled in and wound up. Ernest and Ellis got down the Silver Knight, and fastened some light lines to each of his wings, and brought them down to the carriage. Two or three boys stood round each carriage holding it. At a signal, given by Lemon on his horn, to prepare, they all jumped in. At another, all hands were taken off the carriages, and away most of them went at a fair speed. One did not move—it was Blackall’s. Who could picture his wrath and indignation? He pulled and pulled at the line; the kite rose somewhat, but wavered about terribly: now it darted to one side, now to the other.“Come along, Blackall, come along,” shouted several of the racers, as they moved on, and left him trying all sorts of useless experiments to make the kite pull and the carriage move. Neither one nor the other could he accomplish. Shouts of laughter reached his ear, and he was conscious that they were caused by his ill success. This only increased his rage and bitterness. He stamped in his anger and impatience till he knocked his feet through the boards which formed the bottom of his carriage. He lost all command over himself. He hallooed; he shouted at his kite; and then he swore great, horrible oaths at the kite, and the carriage, and at the wind, till the voice of the Doctor sounded in his ear, ordering him sternly to get out of the carriage and drag it out of the way. He sulkily obeyed, and wound up the string of his kite, and betook himself to the background, trembling lest the Doctor should have overheard his expressions.“I say, Dawson,—I say, Smith,—do you think the old one heard what I said?” he asked, as he was going off, and they stood, not liking to desert him altogether, and yet wishing to go on and see the fun.“I believe you he did, my boy,” answered Smith, who had but little of the milk of human kindness in his composition. “You spoke loud enough to be heard half-a-mile off.”“But I say, Bobby, do you think so? Did he hear me? By Jove, I shall get a pretty jobation if he did!” exclaimed the bully, appealing in a whining tone to Dawson.The wretched, cowardly lad forgot that there was another—a great Omniscient Being—who, at all events, heard him; and that every evil word he had uttered had assuredly been registered in a book whence it would never be erased till the Day of Judgment, when it would be made known to thousands and tens of thousands of astonished and mourning listeners. But such an idea never crossed Blackall’s mind. Had it, perhaps it might have prevented him from uttering the expressions of which he so frequently made use.Fearful only of the immediate disagreeable consequences should the Doctor have heard him, he retired by himself from the ground; while Dawson, and the few other boys who had hitherto adhered to him, set off in pursuit of the racers.With shouts of laughter the racers went on. At first the Green Dragon took the lead, followed closely by the Owl, for both the carriages were very light, and the kites were skilfully managed. Each of them had a second kite attached; for, unless there had been a very strong wind, one would scarcely have dragged them on. Monsieur Malin had selected two boys to manage his carriage, and he ran by their side to direct them; for his own weight would have been too great for it. The Knight and Squire followed closely on the first two carriages. They were flying, on starting, somewhat too high; but Ernest hauled in the lines, and the effect was soon perceptible. On went their daddy-long-legs, as he and Ellis called their car, and soon got up to the Owl.“To-hoo, to-hoo, to-hoo!” cried the directors of the Owl, but the Knight and his Squire pulled away, and the Owl was left astern, and very soon the Green Dragon was overtaken. They, of course, were assailed with the most horrible hisses, and roars, and strange noises of all sorts; but these did not daunt the Knight and his Squire, who went bravely on.“Excelsior! excelsior! Hurra! hurra!” shouted Ernest and Ellis, as their car took the lead. Gradually, but surely, it increased its distance from the rest. Monsieur Malin did his best to manoeuvre his kites; so did Lemon and the rest; but they could not manage to overtake the Knight and his Squire, though they hissed, and roared, and shouted with merry peals of laughter between the intervals, calling them to stop, and not go ahead so fast.“Old Hobson did not deceive us,” observed Ellis; “really this carriage goes along capitally.”“He has done us justice, certainly,” answered Ernest. “But remember, Ellis, our success is entirely owing to your talent and judgment. You think too little of yourself. Now, hurrah! we shall soon be at the winning-post if the wind holds.”Never were there more merry or noisy racers; except, perhaps, in a donkey race, when the winner is the donkey which comes in last.“Very easy to win that sort of race,” some one will say.Not at all, though.In ordinary races, each jockey wishes the horse he rides to win; but, in donkey races,—which I hold to be superior to all others, whether at Goodwood, or Ascot, or Epsom,—each jockey rides his opponent’s donkey, so each is anxious to get in before the other, and, if possible, to leave his own behind.The wind blew fair; the kites drew capitally; the Green Dragon was, after all, not very far behind the Knight and Squire; and the Owl came too-hooing, close upon the Dragon’s tail; while the General Officer seemed in a great hurry to catch the Owl, and kept singing out “Halt! halt! right-about-face,” and other expressions evidently from a somewhat scanty vocabulary of military terms. The rest of the racers came up pretty thickly one after the other.As they reached the winning-post, where one of the masters stood ready to mark the time of their arrival, there was a general shout for Blackall and his fat boy.“Oh, he was last seen in the chalk-pit, hacking him to pieces with his knife, while he seemed inclined to treat his wonderful carriage much in the same way.” A boy who had just come up gave this news.A few expressions of commiseration were uttered by Dawson and others; but in their hearts no one really pitied the bully. How could they? What had he ever done to win the affection, or regard, or esteem of any one of his school-fellows? Certainly, to those with whom he associated and whom he patronised, he had ever done far more harm than good; and of this most of them were aware at the time, though they might not be willing to acknowledge it to themselves; and bitterly were they conscious of it before many years were past, when they reaped the fruits of his pernicious example. Several sunk into early and dishonoured graves: others lived, ruined in health and constitution, to bemoan the fate which their folly and vice had brought on them. But to return to our merry racers.They were called up forthwith to receive their prizes. The most valuable were some serviceable fishing-rods, reels, lines, fishing-baskets, a couple of bows, and the various accoutrements required in archery, a good bat or two, and similar things valued by boys.The Doctor made a very neat speech, and complimented them all on the skill and talent displayed both in kites and carriages.“Especially I must compliment you, Bracebridge, on the beauty of your kites, and the skill with which you have managed them.”“Not me, sir, but Ellis deserves the praise,” answered Ernest in a clear, loud voice, so that every one might hear. “He is a very clever fellow, sir, only he does not know it. He thought of the carriages and the kites, and, indeed, of every thing; I merely helped him. I joined him because I knew that by himself he would be too diffident to carry out his own plans. I was his assistant, that was all.”“I am glad to hear you thus speak of Ellis, but you equally deserve the prize, although you only aided him in carrying out his plans. I have, therefore, to present you with this bow, and all the equipments complete; and you, Ellis, with this fishing-rod, and all the accompanying gear.”Ernest, who was perfectly free from timidity, and always expressed himself well, made a very appropriate reply; and, at poor Ellis’s earnest request, spoke for him also, and said a great deal more in his favour than he would have done himself.Monsieur Malin seemed as much pleased at getting a prize as were any of the boys. A capital fishing-rod was presented to him; and he invited all who had rods to accompany him some day on a grand fishing expedition. Altogether, the kite-flying was most successful; and a stout old gentleman, one of the umpires, expressed a hope that next year they might all enjoy a similar treat; and that he was not at all certain that he should not try to get half-a-dozen kites and a carriage, with which he might join in the race. Several merry voices shouted “We hope you will, sir,—we hope you will.” And that made him so enthusiastic that he promised, if he possibly could, to do as he had proposed.They all went back to a capital, grand half-holiday tea, which was very different to the ordinary meal of bread-and-butter; and consisted of cakes, and sandwiches, and meat-pies, and sausages, and all sorts of substantial productions likely to satisfy the appetites of hungry boys.The only person who did not enjoy the day was Blackall. He came back expecting every instant to be called up by the Doctor; but bed-time came, and he was not summoned. As he was on his way to his room he met Ellis, who was about to pass him without looking at him, or in any way taking notice of him.“What do you mean by grinning at me, you young scamp?” exclaimed Blackall suddenly.“I did not intentionally alter a muscle of my countenance,” answered Ellis quietly. “Did you, however, address me?”“If that’s intended for impudence, take that,” cried Blackall, dealing a heavy blow with his fist on Ellis’s head. “I allow no young jackanapes like you to treat me with contempt.”“But if we feel contempt, how do you expect to be treated?” exclaimed a brisk, confident voice close at his elbow.Blackall turned round to see who had dared thus to beard him. He saw Bracebridge standing close to him, in an attitude which showed that he was prepared for an attack.“You want to get it, do you?” exclaimed Blackall, furiously, at finding his authority disputed by a boy of Ernest’s size. “You shall have more than you expect.”“Now, run off, Ellis; run off,” cried Ernest; “I’ll tackle this fellow.”Ellis did not run, though Blackall let him go and advanced towards Ernest; but Ernest’s undaunted bearing completely staggered him. He stood irresolute; while his opponent fixed his eye boldly on him. He feared some trick. He thought that some big fellow must be behind, ready to back up Bracebridge; or that he knew the Doctor was coming. He judged of other people by what he knew himself to be. He had no conception of the existence of the spirit which animated Ernest.“Well, what are you going to do?” said Ernest, as he stood with clenched fist before him. “If you are going to strike me, do it at once, and get it over. I have no wish to stay here all night, waiting to be attacked by you.”While Ernest was speaking, Blackall was considering what he would do. At last, seeing no one coming, he plucked up courage, and made a dash at Ernest, who, springing aside, adroitly, warded off the blow.Poor Ellis, meantime, stood by, trembling with agitation. He knew from sad experience that the bully hit very hard; and every blow he saw aimed at his friend he felt as if it had hurt him ten times as much as if it had been struck at himself.They were in one of the many passages leading to the bedrooms, through which neither the masters nor servants often passed, so that Blackall knew that he was pretty secure from interruption. Ernest was aware of the same fact. He cared nothing at all about the thrashing he should get, and was only anxious to save Ellis. Ellis, however, would not move, and Blackall looked as if he would thrash both of them.Still more angry at being baulked of his revenge, Blackall again struck at Ernest, and tried to catch him, but in the latter object he did not succeed, though he hurt Ernest’s arm, so that he could with difficulty defend himself; and now blow succeeded blow with considerable rapidity.Bracebridge disdained to fly, and as he could not hope to return the blows with much effect, he contented himself at first with standing on the defensive, waiting his opportunity to hit his powerful opponent in the eye or face, where he might leave a mark not easily effaced. He knew that if he succeeded, he should still further enrage the bully; but he also knew that it was very likely to prevent him from ever attacking him again. As Blackall hit out, he sprang back along the passage, then suddenly stopping, he leaped forward again, and put in the blow he desired.Blackall’s eyes struck fire, but he was too well accustomed to the use, or rather the misuse, of his fists to allow his opponent to escape him. Ernest was again retreating. Blackall caught him under his arm, and was about to inflict the most severe and disagreeable of punishments, by gibbing him, when poor Ellis, who had hitherto stood trembling at a distance, in obedience to Ernest’s directions, could bear it no longer; and, throwing himself forward, leaped on Blackall’s back, and held his arms with all his might and main, butting away at the same time, like a ram, with his head, and kicking furiously with his long legs, biting, it was said, the bully’s ears and cheeks. However that may be, Blackall was compelled to let Ernest go, for the purpose of shaking off his new and ferocious assailant. This was not very easily done, for Ellis had remarkably long and strong arms, and held on like a vice. Ernest seeing this, resolved to bring the bully to terms.“I say, Blackall, if Ellis lets you go, will you promise faithfully not to hurt him in any way, by word, look, or deed?” exclaimed Ernest.Blackall did not deign to reply, but continued his impotent efforts to shake off his old man of the woods. He jumped and leaped, and backed against the walls, but to no purpose; he could not manage to get rid of his burden.“Well, what is your determination?” asked Ernest again, advancing in a threatening attitude towards Blackall, on whom he could now, had he chosen, have inflicted a very severe punishment. “Will you promise faithfully, by all you hold sacred, not to touch or hurt Ellis in any way for this?”“I should think you had better try to make a bargain for yourself first,” said Blackall.“Not I!” said Bracebridge, proudly; “I can stand a thrashing far better than Ellis. I am pretty well accustomed to your lickings, and they don’t hurt me much. Therefore, again, I ask you, will you promise, or will you not?” As he spoke, he doubled his fists, and advanced on Blackall, whose face was completely exposed to an attack, while Ellis kept battering away at his head, and grasped his arms tighter than ever.What might have been the consequences I do not know; Bracebridge, in all probability, would pretty severely have handled the bully, and, his anger being excited, would have left some marks not very easily eradicated on his countenance: when a light was seen in the passage, and a quick step advanced towards them. Bracebridge disdained to fly, and Blackall could not, so they waited the result.“Ah! vat you garçons do there?” exclaimed Monsieur Malin, for it was the French master, holding up his candle. “Let me see! Ah, I understand! You, Blackall, are one very bad boy. You go to bed now. Bracebridge, Ellis, you come with me.”Ellis on this jumped off Blackall’s back, and glad he was to do so, for his arms were beginning to ache terribly with his exertions.Blackall sneaked off, vowing vengeance in his craven heart on his adversaries; and the kind-hearted Frenchman led the other two away, and urged them to keep clear of the bully. When, however, he heard how the affair had taken place, he was very much inclined to go and inform the Doctor, to try and get Blackall expelled, but they entreated aim not to do so, and declared that they did not fear him, and would not run the risk of thus injuring his prospects.“Ah, you are brave garçons, brave garçons!” exclaimed Monsieur Malin.At all events, they were true, right-feeling English boys.

Towards the end of April, the rising sun ushered in a fine breezy morning, with every promise of a strong wind during the day. It was a half-holiday; but on grand occasions of the sort—for it was the day fixed for the kite-race—the boys were allowed to get up and begin lessons an hour earlier than usual. The Doctor always encouraged early rising, and he was, besides, anxious to show us that he took an interest in our amusements, by making such regulations as might facilitate them.

Ernest and Ellis had constantly been to old Hobson’s to see how their carriage was getting on. “Never you mind, young gen’men, it’s all right,” was his answer for some days. “I won’t disappoint you; but you see several has come here who wants such fine painted affairs, that I must get on with them. There’s Mr Blackall, now, who has been and ordered a carriage which I tells him will take six horses to drag; but he says that he has got a kite coming which will pull one along ten miles an hour, twice as big as this, so of course I’ve nothing more to say.”

A large flat case arrived in the morning of the race day for Blackall, just as we were going in to lessons after breakfast; so he had no time to open it. It was not as large as he expected, but still he was very confident that all was right.

Lessons over, we went in to dinner—and that meal got through, with more speed than usual, we all assembled to see the kites and the carriages which had been prepared.

The carpenters were in attendance with the vehicles they had got ready according to orders received. They were of all shapes and plans. Several, among whom was Blackall’s, were very finely painted, but the greater number were mere boxes on wheels, put together at very little expense—which few boys were able to afford, even when clubbing together.

First appeared Monsieur Malin’s kite; it represented a wonderful Green Dragon, twisting and turning about in the most extraordinary way—the tail of the kite being merely the small end of the tail of the dragon. It had great big red eyes, glowing with tinsel, and wings glittering all over, and a tongue which looked capable of doing a large amount of mischief. Loud shouts of applause welcomed the green dragon, as Monsieur Malin held it up like a shield before him, and moved about the playground, hissing, and howling, and making all sorts of dreadful noises.

Tommy Bouldon had joined a club, which produced a magnificent Owl, with a large head, and huge goggling eyes; and never did owl hiss more loudly than did their owl as it met Monsieur Malin’s terrific dragon. They at last rushed at each other with such fury, that Tommy’s head very nearly went through the owl’s body, which would effectually have prevented it from flying at the match.

Lemon and Buttar had fraternised, and in front of them marched a Military Officer, magnificent in a red coat, vast gold epaulets, and no end of gold braiding and trimming, which glittered finely in the sun, while his richly ornamented cocked hat, set across his head, had on the top of it a waving plume of feathers, and a drawn sword in his hand shone in the sunbeams. He looked very fiercely at the dragon and the owl, as he did at everybody, for his eyes were large, and round, and dark.

The Dragon roared, and the Owl hissed at him, when he growled out, “I’ll eat you,” which produced loud shouts of laughter from both of them, while they quietly replied, “You can’t.”

After the General had shown himself, Ellis walked in, bearing a long thin pole, wrapped round, it appeared, by a flag. Ernest accompanied him, carrying a reel of fine but very strong twine. Some boys stared, and others laughed derisively, and asked if he thought that thing was going to fly. “You’ll see—you’ll see,” he answered very quietly.

“Fly!—Dat it will—higher dan any of ours, I tell you, boys,” observed Monsieur Malin, who had eyed it attentively.

Ernest and Ellis marched across the playground, into the field beyond, out of sight, and in less than two minutes returned, bearing aloft a magnificent Knight in silver armour, with a glittering shield on his arm, a plume on his helmet, and a spear in his hand. His visor was up, and his countenance, with a fine black beard and moustache, looked forth fiercely beneath it, while a band of roses, which was thrown over his shoulder, hung down and formed a very magnificent tail, glittering with jewels. No sooner did the gallant knight make his appearance than the derisive laughter and sneers were changed into shouts of applause. All were agreed that never had a more beautiful kite appeared.

“All very well,” cried Dawson, who was expecting Blackall’s kite to come forth, “but it is a question with me whether such a gimcrack-looking affair will fly.”

Blackall had meantime been busily employed in unpacking his kite, which was to create so much astonishment, and do such mighty things. He undid the strings and brown paper, and laths, which surrounded it, with eager haste. A number of boys were looking on, all curious to see what was to be produced. Dawson was among the most sanguine, expecting that something very fine was to appear. At last Blackall was seen to scratch his head, and to look somewhat annoyed.

“Come, come, Blackall,” exclaimed Sandford, one of the biggest fellows, and certainly no friend of his; “let us see this precious kite of yours. Out with it, man.”

“Mind your own business, Sandford,” answered the bully, sulkily. “I’ll show the kite when I feel inclined.”

“Ho, ho, ho!” replied Sandford, laughing; and knowing perfectly well that Blackall dared not retaliate, stooping down, he lifted the kite, and held it up to the view of the whole school. There was a picture of a big ugly boy daubed in the commonest ochre, and bearing evident marks of its toy-shop origin, though Tommy Bouldon and others declared that they recognised in it a strong likeness to Blackall himself. Blackall seemed to think that some trick had been played him, though it was very clear that the likeness was accidental.

“It’s pretty plain who’s got the ugliest and most stupid looking kite,” said Buttar, as he passed by. “Very like himself. I wonder if it will fly.”

“Yes, if it can find a small kite up in the sky to thrash,” observed Bouldon. “But, I say, let us give three cheers for Blackall’s toy-shop kite. I wonder if he will take it as a compliment.”

A boisterous, if not a hearty, cheer was quickly raised, which barely served to cover a chorus of hisses and groans uttered by a number of little fellows, who had been in the habit of receiving gratuitous kicks and cuffs from their amicable companion.

There were several ordinary kites, remarkable chiefly for their size, being made of newspapers; but there were others contributing an ingenious variety of devices—bats, and frogs, and fish of curious shapes. The flying-fish especially looked very natural as they glittered in the sunbeams, only people could not help inquiring how they came to be up so high in the air.

At last all were ready to set forth; some pushed the carriages, and others carried the kites. Ernest and Ellis rolled up theirs, and carried it along very easily. The Doctor led the way, accompanied by two or three of the biggest fellows; but he would every now and then stop, and call up some of the smaller ones to have a talk with them.

The ground chosen for the trial of the kites was a high, downy table-land, with a fine flat surface. It was a very pretty sight to see all the boys, with their carriages and gaily-coloured kites, assembled together. There were nearly fifty kites, for many brought small kites, with which they had no intention to contend for a prize. All the masters, and several friends of the Doctor’s and some of the boys, attended to act as umpires. At last everything was arranged.

The kite-flyers formed one long line, with the wind in their backs. The first point to be decided was the beauty of the kites. Lemon had his horn, which was to be used as a signal. He blew three shrill blasts. At the sound of the third, up they all flew, some starting rapidly upwards; others wavering about before ascending; a few refusing to mount altogether beyond a few yards off the ground. However, the greater number mounted rapidly, their brilliant colours flashing in the sunbeams. The spectators clapped their hands loudly, as a mark of their approbation, and then set to work to make notes, that they might decide when called on to declare on whom the prizes ought to be bestowed.

Monsieur Malin’s Green Dragon came in for a large share of praise, so did the General Officer; but Ellis’s Knight of the Silver Shield was decided to be the most elegant and beautiful of all the kites, and the owner was called forth to receive his meed of applause.

Many were surprised when they saw Ellis, with his awkward gait, shuffling out from among the crowd; and, more especially, when he announced himself, in a hesitating tone, not only as the maker, but as the designer of the Knight of the Silver Shield.

One kite went up some way, just sufficient to exhibit its ugliness, but wavered and rolled about in the most extraordinary manner, evidently showing that it was lop-sided. It received shouts, but they were not of applause, and they were accompanied by hisses, which the Doctor, however, repressed. The kite received in this unflattering way was Blackall’s boasted toy-shop production. He was highly indignant, and walked about stamping with rage.

Buttar and Bouldon were much amused, and expressed a hope that he would expend his fury on his kite, and cut it to pieces. He drew out his knife, evidently with that intention, but he had not the heart to attack it.

“I’ll tell you what it is, Bobby,” said he to Dawson, who was standing by not a little disgusted, “it pulls terrifically hard, and in my opinion, if it is altered a little, and has a heavier wing put on the right side, it will yet do magnificently, and make all those howling monkeys change their tone. That dolt Ellis, and that conceited chap Bracebridge, will soon find that their finely-bedizened machine is cut out. My carriage is, I know, such a first-rate one, that it will go along with anything.”

Dawson was in great hopes that Blackall was right, for he had staked his reputation, as he said, on the success of his patron and his imported kite, and he had no fancy to find himself laughed at. In what Master Bobby Dawson’s reputation consisted he did not stop to inquire, and certainly anybody else would have been very puzzled to say.

The rest of the kite-flyers troubled themselves very little about Blackall and his ill success. They were all intent on making their own kites perform their best. After the kites had flown for some time, the Doctor advanced from the group of spectators and umpires, and summoned Ellis and Monsieur Malin, and, with an appropriate address, bestowed on them the two first prizes, complimenting them on their design, and the beauty of the execution.

And now the time arrived to try which kites could fly the highest. All were hauled in, and the boys stood as before in a row. The signal was given by Lemon, and up they went, soaring far away into the blue sky. This time Ernest had a kite as well as Ellis. It was a good large kite, with remarkably strong string. The device was that of a man-at-arms, with a gleaming battle-axe over his shoulder, or, as Ernest called it, the Squire.

“Why, Bracebridge! what do you expect that kite to do, eh?” exclaimed Lemon. “It is too heavy-looking to fly, and not large enough to drag a carriage.”

“I hope that at all events he will do his duty, and prove a faithful Squire,” answered Bracebridge.

“I wonder what he means?” said several boys who overheard him.

Away soared the kites; some of them appeared as if they would never come down again. The Green Dragon rose very high, and must have astonished the birds and beasts of the field, if it did not the human beings in the valley below. The Silver Knight also played his part well up in the skies, so did the General, and many others. Up, up went the Green Dragon, and high soared the Silver Knight; Excelsior was his motto; but high as he went, the Green Dragon went higher.

“Hilloa, Bracebridge, you and your friend should have chosen a different motto for your knight, for the Green Dragon is beating him, and the old Owl is not far behind,” exclaimed Lemon, who, while manoeuvring his kite, found himself not far from Ernest.

“Stay a bit,” answered Ernest, in a good-natured tone; “perhaps our knight may yet prove that his motto was not ill-chosen. We have not yet got to the end of our line.”

Monsieur Malin kept easing out his line, and his monster went slowly upward, but it was evident that the weight of string it had already to bear was almost too much for it, and that it would not carry much more. It was a brave dragon, however, and in the French master’s skilful hands, it is extraordinary how high it got up. At last it was evident that it was stationary, and required a great deal of manoeuvring to be kept at the height it had attained.

“Now, Bracebridge,” cried Ellis, who had worked the Silver Knight up almost as high, “let me have your line.”

“All right,” answered Bracebridge, hauling down his kite till it was within thirty feet of the ground. “Hook on.”

On this Ellis brought the end of his line up to Bracebridge, who fastened it to the string of the Squire, which immediately shot upward, while higher and higher flew the Silver Knight. He reached the Green Dragon, and floated proudly past him. Up he went, higher and higher, till a glittering spot could alone be seen in the blue heavens. Shouts of applause broke from the spectators.

“Now,” cried Bracebridge triumphantly, “has not our knight chosen his motto with judgment, Excelsior? See, up he goes higher and higher.”

Higher he did go, indeed; and in a short time the glittering spot was lost to view.

“We could easily get our Squire out of sight also, if we could find a line light enough and strong enough to bear the strain of the two kites together, but no string we have got here could bear the strain that would be put upon it,” observed Ernest to those who came round to observe the wonder which had been wrought.

Some declared that it was not fair, and that they had no right to fasten the string of one kite to that of another.

“Oh! that’s all nonsense, and you fellows know it well,” answered Ernest. “The question to be decided is, which kite can reach the farthest from the earth, and ours has done so. Unless another gets higher, we shall win the prize.”

No other kite got even so high as the Green Dragon, so the Silver Knight was most justly declared to be the winner of the prize.

“Froggy Malin’s and those fellows’ kites may fly high, but they will not be able to pull anything along,” growled out Blackall. “Before they think that they are going to carry off all the prizes, let us see what my kite can do. He looks like a strong, tough fellow, who can pull hard at all events.”

Dawson and a few of Blackall’s admirers echoed these sentiments, fully believing that he did not boast without reason of what he would do.

The carriages were now brought forward from a chalk-pit, where they had been concealed, and formed a line in front of the spectators. Blackall’s was certainly the largest, and not the least gay and gaudy, but more than one person smiled at the notion of its being dragged along by a single kite. None of the carriages could boast of much beauty, but some were very finely painted, and were admired accordingly. When Ernest brought out his vehicle, it was much laughed at, for it had such an odd, spider-like, skeleton look. Still the knowing ones acknowledged that it might have a great deal of go in it.

Most of the line of the kites was now hauled in and wound up. Ernest and Ellis got down the Silver Knight, and fastened some light lines to each of his wings, and brought them down to the carriage. Two or three boys stood round each carriage holding it. At a signal, given by Lemon on his horn, to prepare, they all jumped in. At another, all hands were taken off the carriages, and away most of them went at a fair speed. One did not move—it was Blackall’s. Who could picture his wrath and indignation? He pulled and pulled at the line; the kite rose somewhat, but wavered about terribly: now it darted to one side, now to the other.

“Come along, Blackall, come along,” shouted several of the racers, as they moved on, and left him trying all sorts of useless experiments to make the kite pull and the carriage move. Neither one nor the other could he accomplish. Shouts of laughter reached his ear, and he was conscious that they were caused by his ill success. This only increased his rage and bitterness. He stamped in his anger and impatience till he knocked his feet through the boards which formed the bottom of his carriage. He lost all command over himself. He hallooed; he shouted at his kite; and then he swore great, horrible oaths at the kite, and the carriage, and at the wind, till the voice of the Doctor sounded in his ear, ordering him sternly to get out of the carriage and drag it out of the way. He sulkily obeyed, and wound up the string of his kite, and betook himself to the background, trembling lest the Doctor should have overheard his expressions.

“I say, Dawson,—I say, Smith,—do you think the old one heard what I said?” he asked, as he was going off, and they stood, not liking to desert him altogether, and yet wishing to go on and see the fun.

“I believe you he did, my boy,” answered Smith, who had but little of the milk of human kindness in his composition. “You spoke loud enough to be heard half-a-mile off.”

“But I say, Bobby, do you think so? Did he hear me? By Jove, I shall get a pretty jobation if he did!” exclaimed the bully, appealing in a whining tone to Dawson.

The wretched, cowardly lad forgot that there was another—a great Omniscient Being—who, at all events, heard him; and that every evil word he had uttered had assuredly been registered in a book whence it would never be erased till the Day of Judgment, when it would be made known to thousands and tens of thousands of astonished and mourning listeners. But such an idea never crossed Blackall’s mind. Had it, perhaps it might have prevented him from uttering the expressions of which he so frequently made use.

Fearful only of the immediate disagreeable consequences should the Doctor have heard him, he retired by himself from the ground; while Dawson, and the few other boys who had hitherto adhered to him, set off in pursuit of the racers.

With shouts of laughter the racers went on. At first the Green Dragon took the lead, followed closely by the Owl, for both the carriages were very light, and the kites were skilfully managed. Each of them had a second kite attached; for, unless there had been a very strong wind, one would scarcely have dragged them on. Monsieur Malin had selected two boys to manage his carriage, and he ran by their side to direct them; for his own weight would have been too great for it. The Knight and Squire followed closely on the first two carriages. They were flying, on starting, somewhat too high; but Ernest hauled in the lines, and the effect was soon perceptible. On went their daddy-long-legs, as he and Ellis called their car, and soon got up to the Owl.

“To-hoo, to-hoo, to-hoo!” cried the directors of the Owl, but the Knight and his Squire pulled away, and the Owl was left astern, and very soon the Green Dragon was overtaken. They, of course, were assailed with the most horrible hisses, and roars, and strange noises of all sorts; but these did not daunt the Knight and his Squire, who went bravely on.

“Excelsior! excelsior! Hurra! hurra!” shouted Ernest and Ellis, as their car took the lead. Gradually, but surely, it increased its distance from the rest. Monsieur Malin did his best to manoeuvre his kites; so did Lemon and the rest; but they could not manage to overtake the Knight and his Squire, though they hissed, and roared, and shouted with merry peals of laughter between the intervals, calling them to stop, and not go ahead so fast.

“Old Hobson did not deceive us,” observed Ellis; “really this carriage goes along capitally.”

“He has done us justice, certainly,” answered Ernest. “But remember, Ellis, our success is entirely owing to your talent and judgment. You think too little of yourself. Now, hurrah! we shall soon be at the winning-post if the wind holds.”

Never were there more merry or noisy racers; except, perhaps, in a donkey race, when the winner is the donkey which comes in last.

“Very easy to win that sort of race,” some one will say.

Not at all, though.

In ordinary races, each jockey wishes the horse he rides to win; but, in donkey races,—which I hold to be superior to all others, whether at Goodwood, or Ascot, or Epsom,—each jockey rides his opponent’s donkey, so each is anxious to get in before the other, and, if possible, to leave his own behind.

The wind blew fair; the kites drew capitally; the Green Dragon was, after all, not very far behind the Knight and Squire; and the Owl came too-hooing, close upon the Dragon’s tail; while the General Officer seemed in a great hurry to catch the Owl, and kept singing out “Halt! halt! right-about-face,” and other expressions evidently from a somewhat scanty vocabulary of military terms. The rest of the racers came up pretty thickly one after the other.

As they reached the winning-post, where one of the masters stood ready to mark the time of their arrival, there was a general shout for Blackall and his fat boy.

“Oh, he was last seen in the chalk-pit, hacking him to pieces with his knife, while he seemed inclined to treat his wonderful carriage much in the same way.” A boy who had just come up gave this news.

A few expressions of commiseration were uttered by Dawson and others; but in their hearts no one really pitied the bully. How could they? What had he ever done to win the affection, or regard, or esteem of any one of his school-fellows? Certainly, to those with whom he associated and whom he patronised, he had ever done far more harm than good; and of this most of them were aware at the time, though they might not be willing to acknowledge it to themselves; and bitterly were they conscious of it before many years were past, when they reaped the fruits of his pernicious example. Several sunk into early and dishonoured graves: others lived, ruined in health and constitution, to bemoan the fate which their folly and vice had brought on them. But to return to our merry racers.

They were called up forthwith to receive their prizes. The most valuable were some serviceable fishing-rods, reels, lines, fishing-baskets, a couple of bows, and the various accoutrements required in archery, a good bat or two, and similar things valued by boys.

The Doctor made a very neat speech, and complimented them all on the skill and talent displayed both in kites and carriages.

“Especially I must compliment you, Bracebridge, on the beauty of your kites, and the skill with which you have managed them.”

“Not me, sir, but Ellis deserves the praise,” answered Ernest in a clear, loud voice, so that every one might hear. “He is a very clever fellow, sir, only he does not know it. He thought of the carriages and the kites, and, indeed, of every thing; I merely helped him. I joined him because I knew that by himself he would be too diffident to carry out his own plans. I was his assistant, that was all.”

“I am glad to hear you thus speak of Ellis, but you equally deserve the prize, although you only aided him in carrying out his plans. I have, therefore, to present you with this bow, and all the equipments complete; and you, Ellis, with this fishing-rod, and all the accompanying gear.”

Ernest, who was perfectly free from timidity, and always expressed himself well, made a very appropriate reply; and, at poor Ellis’s earnest request, spoke for him also, and said a great deal more in his favour than he would have done himself.

Monsieur Malin seemed as much pleased at getting a prize as were any of the boys. A capital fishing-rod was presented to him; and he invited all who had rods to accompany him some day on a grand fishing expedition. Altogether, the kite-flying was most successful; and a stout old gentleman, one of the umpires, expressed a hope that next year they might all enjoy a similar treat; and that he was not at all certain that he should not try to get half-a-dozen kites and a carriage, with which he might join in the race. Several merry voices shouted “We hope you will, sir,—we hope you will.” And that made him so enthusiastic that he promised, if he possibly could, to do as he had proposed.

They all went back to a capital, grand half-holiday tea, which was very different to the ordinary meal of bread-and-butter; and consisted of cakes, and sandwiches, and meat-pies, and sausages, and all sorts of substantial productions likely to satisfy the appetites of hungry boys.

The only person who did not enjoy the day was Blackall. He came back expecting every instant to be called up by the Doctor; but bed-time came, and he was not summoned. As he was on his way to his room he met Ellis, who was about to pass him without looking at him, or in any way taking notice of him.

“What do you mean by grinning at me, you young scamp?” exclaimed Blackall suddenly.

“I did not intentionally alter a muscle of my countenance,” answered Ellis quietly. “Did you, however, address me?”

“If that’s intended for impudence, take that,” cried Blackall, dealing a heavy blow with his fist on Ellis’s head. “I allow no young jackanapes like you to treat me with contempt.”

“But if we feel contempt, how do you expect to be treated?” exclaimed a brisk, confident voice close at his elbow.

Blackall turned round to see who had dared thus to beard him. He saw Bracebridge standing close to him, in an attitude which showed that he was prepared for an attack.

“You want to get it, do you?” exclaimed Blackall, furiously, at finding his authority disputed by a boy of Ernest’s size. “You shall have more than you expect.”

“Now, run off, Ellis; run off,” cried Ernest; “I’ll tackle this fellow.”

Ellis did not run, though Blackall let him go and advanced towards Ernest; but Ernest’s undaunted bearing completely staggered him. He stood irresolute; while his opponent fixed his eye boldly on him. He feared some trick. He thought that some big fellow must be behind, ready to back up Bracebridge; or that he knew the Doctor was coming. He judged of other people by what he knew himself to be. He had no conception of the existence of the spirit which animated Ernest.

“Well, what are you going to do?” said Ernest, as he stood with clenched fist before him. “If you are going to strike me, do it at once, and get it over. I have no wish to stay here all night, waiting to be attacked by you.”

While Ernest was speaking, Blackall was considering what he would do. At last, seeing no one coming, he plucked up courage, and made a dash at Ernest, who, springing aside, adroitly, warded off the blow.

Poor Ellis, meantime, stood by, trembling with agitation. He knew from sad experience that the bully hit very hard; and every blow he saw aimed at his friend he felt as if it had hurt him ten times as much as if it had been struck at himself.

They were in one of the many passages leading to the bedrooms, through which neither the masters nor servants often passed, so that Blackall knew that he was pretty secure from interruption. Ernest was aware of the same fact. He cared nothing at all about the thrashing he should get, and was only anxious to save Ellis. Ellis, however, would not move, and Blackall looked as if he would thrash both of them.

Still more angry at being baulked of his revenge, Blackall again struck at Ernest, and tried to catch him, but in the latter object he did not succeed, though he hurt Ernest’s arm, so that he could with difficulty defend himself; and now blow succeeded blow with considerable rapidity.

Bracebridge disdained to fly, and as he could not hope to return the blows with much effect, he contented himself at first with standing on the defensive, waiting his opportunity to hit his powerful opponent in the eye or face, where he might leave a mark not easily effaced. He knew that if he succeeded, he should still further enrage the bully; but he also knew that it was very likely to prevent him from ever attacking him again. As Blackall hit out, he sprang back along the passage, then suddenly stopping, he leaped forward again, and put in the blow he desired.

Blackall’s eyes struck fire, but he was too well accustomed to the use, or rather the misuse, of his fists to allow his opponent to escape him. Ernest was again retreating. Blackall caught him under his arm, and was about to inflict the most severe and disagreeable of punishments, by gibbing him, when poor Ellis, who had hitherto stood trembling at a distance, in obedience to Ernest’s directions, could bear it no longer; and, throwing himself forward, leaped on Blackall’s back, and held his arms with all his might and main, butting away at the same time, like a ram, with his head, and kicking furiously with his long legs, biting, it was said, the bully’s ears and cheeks. However that may be, Blackall was compelled to let Ernest go, for the purpose of shaking off his new and ferocious assailant. This was not very easily done, for Ellis had remarkably long and strong arms, and held on like a vice. Ernest seeing this, resolved to bring the bully to terms.

“I say, Blackall, if Ellis lets you go, will you promise faithfully not to hurt him in any way, by word, look, or deed?” exclaimed Ernest.

Blackall did not deign to reply, but continued his impotent efforts to shake off his old man of the woods. He jumped and leaped, and backed against the walls, but to no purpose; he could not manage to get rid of his burden.

“Well, what is your determination?” asked Ernest again, advancing in a threatening attitude towards Blackall, on whom he could now, had he chosen, have inflicted a very severe punishment. “Will you promise faithfully, by all you hold sacred, not to touch or hurt Ellis in any way for this?”

“I should think you had better try to make a bargain for yourself first,” said Blackall.

“Not I!” said Bracebridge, proudly; “I can stand a thrashing far better than Ellis. I am pretty well accustomed to your lickings, and they don’t hurt me much. Therefore, again, I ask you, will you promise, or will you not?” As he spoke, he doubled his fists, and advanced on Blackall, whose face was completely exposed to an attack, while Ellis kept battering away at his head, and grasped his arms tighter than ever.

What might have been the consequences I do not know; Bracebridge, in all probability, would pretty severely have handled the bully, and, his anger being excited, would have left some marks not very easily eradicated on his countenance: when a light was seen in the passage, and a quick step advanced towards them. Bracebridge disdained to fly, and Blackall could not, so they waited the result.

“Ah! vat you garçons do there?” exclaimed Monsieur Malin, for it was the French master, holding up his candle. “Let me see! Ah, I understand! You, Blackall, are one very bad boy. You go to bed now. Bracebridge, Ellis, you come with me.”

Ellis on this jumped off Blackall’s back, and glad he was to do so, for his arms were beginning to ache terribly with his exertions.

Blackall sneaked off, vowing vengeance in his craven heart on his adversaries; and the kind-hearted Frenchman led the other two away, and urged them to keep clear of the bully. When, however, he heard how the affair had taken place, he was very much inclined to go and inform the Doctor, to try and get Blackall expelled, but they entreated aim not to do so, and declared that they did not fear him, and would not run the risk of thus injuring his prospects.

“Ah, you are brave garçons, brave garçons!” exclaimed Monsieur Malin.

At all events, they were true, right-feeling English boys.

Chapter Six.Our Military Exercises.Bracebridge had to press his advice on Ellis more than once before he could induce him to apply for leave to drill and to learn fencing and the broadsword exercise. All these sort of lessons were classed among the extras, so that the Doctor did not insist on the boys learning them unless by the express wish of their parents. If they themselves wished to learn them, they had to write home and get leave. This system, I fancy, made these branches of education far more popular than they would otherwise have been. The several masters, knowing that the number of their pupils depended on the interest they could excite in their respective sciences, did their utmost to make them attractive. They generally succeeded.Monsieur Malin would, at all events, have been popular. He was a gentleman by birth and by education, of polished manners, and very good-natured, and as everybody liked him, everybody wished to learn French. Old Dibble, our drill-sergeant, was very unlike him in most respects, but still he won all our hearts. He was a kind-hearted man, and had an excellent temper, and he took great pains to teach us our drill and to make us like it. He was the very man to turn us all into soldiers, and, as Bracebridge had said of him, he never grew weary of recounting his deeds of arms to all whom he could find ready to listen. He was a tall man, somewhat stout, with a bald patch on the top of his head, and grey hair and whiskers, a thoroughly soldier-like hooked nose, and fine piercing grey eyes. Good-natured as he was, he would stand no nonsense or any skylarking; and we all agreed that when he was in the army he was certain to have kept all the men under him in capital order.Our dancing-master was Mr Jay. He was a proficient in his art; and though he might not have been able to jump as high or to spin round on one leg as long as an opera-dancer, he was able to teach us to dance like gentlemen. He was also a professor of fencing and gymnastics, and a very good instructor he was. He understood thoroughly what the human body could do, and what it might do advantageously. He also taught boxing.The Doctor was a great encourager of all athletic exercises, and allowed all the boys who wished it to take lessons in boxing once a week for half-an-hour at a time. The greater number availed themselves of the permission, and most of the school were very good boxers. The result was that, as a rule, we were a most peaceable set of boys, and I believe that fewer quarrels took place than among any equal number of boys in England. We had a riding-master, who used to come every Saturday with five or six ponies, and give us lessons in a paddock attached to the school-grounds. The Doctor used to say that his wish was to educate our hearts, our minds, and our bodies as far as he had the power, and that he found from experience that the greater variety of instruction he could give us, the more perfectly he could accomplish his object. He himself gave us instruction in swimming. I have described the pond in the grounds. He used a machine something like a large fishing-rod. A belt was fastened round the waist of a young swimmer, and by the belt he was secured to the end of a line hanging from the rod. The Doctor used to stand, rod in hand, and encourage and advise the boy till he gained confidence and knew how to strike out properly. He was anxious to prevent any one from getting into a bad way of striking out, for, as he used to say, it was as difficult to get rid of a bad habit as to acquire a good one. He was, therefore, always waging a deadly warfare against all bad habits from their very commencement, not only with regard to swimming, but in every other action of life. As soon as a boy had learned to strike out properly, he turned him over to the instruction of one of the bigger boys, who had especial charge of him in the water. He had always four or five boys whom he had taught to swim thoroughly well, and he made them swimming-masters. They benefited by having to give instruction to others, and by learning to keep their tempers. Nothing, perhaps, tries the temper so much as having to teach dull or inattentive boys. Blackall had been made one of the swimming-masters, but at the commencement of the bathing season the Doctor called him up, and without a word of explanation told him that he thought fit to dismiss him from the post. He lost, in consequence, several privileges attached to the office. To a person of Blackall’s character, the mode of his dismissal was a considerable punishment. It showed him that the Doctor was aware of some of his misconduct, but of how much he was still left in ignorance, and he had to live on in fear that some more severe punishment was still in store for him. I am glad to say that there were very few other fellows at all like Blackall in the school. There were, of course, some few bullies and blackguards, or who would speedily have become so if left to their own devices, and there were cowards, and boys who carelessly told an untruth, or were addicted to the too common vice of prevarication. There were also vicious boys, or who would have been vicious had they not been watched and restrained. These were exceptions to the general rule. The Doctor’s system, embracing the law of kindness, answered well, and brought forth good fruits.“Come along, Ellis,” said Ernest, one Saturday afternoon, when he found his friend busily working away at the model of a vessel he was cutting out of a piece of American pine; “there’s Sergeant Dibble in the playground; I’ll take you up to him, and tell him that he must turn you into a soldier before the holidays. He’ll do it if you obey his directions.” Sergeant Dibble was found in the middle of the playground, surrounded by a number of boys, who were listening eagerly to one of his stories with which he was amusing them till the hour to commence had arrived.“The reason why we conquered was this, young gentlemen,” he was saying. “Every man, from the highest to the lowest, knew his duty and did it. If they didn’t know it and didn’t do it, Lord Wellington sent them about their business, no matter who they were. Remember that when you grow up. Your duty, I take it, is to do your best in whatever station you may be placed; what you are certain will produce the best results and forward the objects in which you are engaged. It is not enough to say, ‘Such were my orders;’ you must try and discover the spirit of your orders. Above all things, you must never be afraid of responsibility. Never be afraid of being found fault with when you know that you’ve done what’s right. I was going to tell you how we crossed the river Douro, in Portugal; how we surprised Marshal Soult, and how Lord Wellington ate the dinner which had been prepared for him and his staff. We very nearly made him and his whole army prisoners, and we followed them up so closely that they had no time to rest till they were clear out of Portugal; but the hour is up. Fall in, young gentlemen; fall in!”Ernest took this opportunity to go up to the Sergeant and to explain that he would find Ellis a very willing though, perhaps, a very awkward pupil, and begged that he would treat him accordingly, and not suppose that his awkwardness arose from carelessness or idleness.Sergeant Dibble looked at Ellis for a few moments. “No fear, Master Bracebridge,” he answered; “I’ve made a first-rate soldier out of far worse materials. If he’s the will, he’ll soon get them long arms and legs to do their duty. It’s rather hard work to get a person who has no ear to march in time, but that’s to be overcome by perseverance, and the eye must be made to do the work which the ear cannot. Fall in, Master Ellis, if you please.”Ellis had no notion of what falling in meant, so he shuffled about from place to place, looking up inquiringly at the Sergeant. “Take your place, I mean, in the awkward squad, Master Ellis.”“That’s where I shall always have to be,” thought poor Ellis. “Which are the awkwardest squad, Sergeant?” said he, looking up. “It strikes me that I should go there.”Whatever Ellis thought of himself, there were several other boys just as awkward, or at all events as unapt to learn military manners. Little Eden was one of them, that is to say, he always forgot what he had learned during his previous lesson. Gregson was another. He was not awkward in his movements, but while instruction was going forward he was always thinking of something else. One reason that Bracebridge succeeded so well in whatever he undertook was, that he had the power of concentrating his attention on whatever he was about; in the school-room or play-room, in the cricket-field or on the parade-ground, it was the same. It was his great talent. He had many other talents, and he also had, from his earliest days, been well trained. Had he been an only son, he might have been spoiled, but he had many brothers, and his temper had been tried, and he had been taught to command himself, and while he relied on his own energies for success, to obey his elders and to treat all his fellow-creatures with respect. Sergeant Dibble very soon pronounced him his best drill. The awkward squad had been standing by themselves for some minutes, looking very awkward, indeed, when Sergeant Dibble exclaimed—“Fall out, Mr Bracebridge, and take charge of that squad. Exercise them in the balance step, and put them through their facings.”Ernest, not a little proud, obeyed, and while the rest of the young soldiers were marching up and down, taking open order, wheeling to the right or left, and going through a variety of manoeuvres, he placed himself in front of the boys I have described, with others, making altogether about a dozen. His first aim was to awaken them all up. “Attention!” he exclaimed in a sharp tone, which made them all spring up suddenly. He then explained very clearly what he wanted them to do, and put himself in the required attitude, taking care that they all did the same. Very few could not do the balance step. Chivey and other hopping games had taught them that. He kept them at it a very few minutes, and then telling them to practise it by themselves, went on to teach them their facings, explaining the object of each movement. He did it all in so patient and good-natured a manner that every boy in the squad expressed a hope that Bracebridge might be set to teach them again.“I’ll tell you what we will do; we will work away every day in the week, and when Sergeant Dibble comes next week we will show him what we can do.” The idea was taken up enthusiastically, and even the least apt of the squad made great progress. In two or three weeks they were fully equal to those who had been drilling all the half. Sergeant Dibble was delighted, and foretold that if Master Bracebridge went into the army he would distinguish himself.“I don’t know what I am to be,” replied Ernest; “I know that I am to do everything I am set to do as well as I can.”There were some twenty boys or more who were very far from perfect in their drill in the larger squad, and Sergeant Dibble managed to persuade them to put themselves, during the week, under Ernest’s instruction. Some few, at first, kicked at the notion, but finally all agreed to obey his orders on the parade-ground during one hour every day. Others, of their own accord, joined, and in a short time he had quite a large army of volunteers. He spared no pains to perfect them. He got the Sergeant to bring him a “Manual of Drill Instruction,” and every spare moment he spent in studying it attentively.In a few weeks Ernest’s squad surpassed that composed of the older boys in the accuracy and rapidity of their movement; and Sergeant Dibble, when he came, expressed his astonishment and delight on finding what could be done when all set to work with a will to do it.Ernest, too, gained great popularity, and many who had before rather envied him now frankly acknowledged his talents and excellent qualities. He himself also behaved very well. He did not set himself up above the rest in consequence of what he had done and the applause he had gained, but the moment the drill was over he became like one of the rest, and took his hat, or his fishing-rod, or his hoop—though, by the by, he was getting rather out of hoops—and went off shouting and laughing with all the merry throng.The greatest possible change was worked in Ellis. He no longer looked like the same boy. The alteration in his appearance was almost as striking as that which takes place in a country clown caught by a recruiting sergeant, half drunk at a fair, as he rolls on, looking every moment as if he was going to topple over, from public-house to public-house, and when he has been under the drill-sergeant’s hands for a couple of years, and is turned into the trim, active, intelligent soldier. At first, few who saw poor Ellis’s awkward attempts could possibly avoid laughing. How he rolled from side to side; how he stuck out one foot, and changed it again and again, finding that it was the wrong one; how, when the word “to the right-about” was given, he invariably found himself grinning in the face of his left-hand man, unless by good chance the latter had made the same mistake as himself, when he became suddenly inspired with the hope that he had, for a wonder, hit off the right thing. He soon found his hopes disappointed by being summoned to repeat the movement, with a caution to do it correctly. Then, on receiving the order to march, he nearly always started off with his right foot instead of his left, and when he did put out the left, he quickly changed it to the right, under the impression that he must have made a mistake. Still his perseverance was most praiseworthy. Bracebridge had assured him that in time he would become a good soldier if he wished it, and a good soldier he resolved to be, whether he followed up the profession or not. He read as hard as he had ever done, and found time to manufacture all sorts of things, and yet no one practised more than he did drilling, and games, and all sorts of athletic exercises. Before the change I have described was perceptible, the half was nearly over, and the summer holidays were about to begin. I have, in mentioning it, run on somewhat ahead of events. Ernest had advised him to learn to dance and to fence.“Come, come, you are joking now, old fellow,” was his reply, in his former melancholy tone of voice. “I may learn any rough affair, like drilling and gymnastics, and, perhaps, the broadsword exercises, and learn enough to cut a fellow’s head off; but to hop and skip about to the sound of a fiddle, or to handle a thin bar of steel so as to prevent another fellow with a similar weapon running his into me, is totally beyond my powers. I know that I could not, if I was to try ever so much.”“So you thought about gymnastics, and so you thought about drilling, and yet you have succeeded very well in both. Remember the motto of our Silver Knight. Push on up the hill; work away at one thing, and then another. It is extraordinary how much may be learnt in a short time, if people will but give their minds to what they are about. I know a good number of things, and I can do a good number of things, and yet I have not spent more hours of my life with a book before me than have most boys of my age; but then, when I have had a book before me, I have been really busy, getting all I could out of it; I have not sat idling and frittering away my time as so many fellows do. I don’t fancy that I cannot do a thing because it is difficult; I always try to find out where the difficulty lies, and then see how I can best get over it. I like difficulties, because I like to conquer them. This world is full of difficulties, which it is the business of men to conquer. A farmer cannot get a field of corn to grow without overcoming difficulties. He must dig up or plough up the ground; he must get rid of the weeds; he must trench it, and after a time manure it; and this he must do year after year, or it will not produce abundantly. And so it is throughout all the works to be done in this world: then why should we expect to get knowledge, to cultivate our minds, to get rid of the weeds growing up constantly in them, without labour, and hard labour, too? Now, I dare say, my dear fellow, you think that I am talking very learnedly, or you may say, very pedantically; but I do not even claim originality for my views. My father pointed them out to me and my brothers long ago. He threw difficulties in our way, and stood by till we overcame them, telling us it was the best practice we could have in the world. I cannot tell you how much we owe to our father. He is the wisest man I ever met. I dare say there are many cleverer people; men who can talk better, and have done more, and have written more, and who are thought much more of in the world; but my brother and I agree, for all that, that he is the wisest, and if not the most talented, which we don’t say he is, that he makes the best use of the talents he has got. You must come and see him one of these days; I would say at once; but I think that you will like him, and that he will like you better by and by. I wrote to him about you, I must confess that, and he put me up to some of the advice I gave you. My brothers and I always write to him just as we write to one another; indeed, we generally pass our letters on to him, because we know that he likes to hear everything that we are doing. We have no secrets from him, as I find some fellows here have. We always go to him for advice about everything. He often tells us to act as we think best, and to let him know what we have done. Sometimes he tells us that he thinks we have acted very judiciously; at other times he tells us that, from the judgment he has been able to form, we ought to have done differently. He has never kept us in what might be called leading-strings; but has placed the same confidence in us that we do in him—that is to say, he knows we want to do what is right. Depend on it, Ellis, there is nothing like having the most perfect confidence between your father and yourself. I assure you that I should be miserable if I had not, and if I did not believe that he is the best friend I have on earth, or ever shall have.”Bracebridge said a great deal more to the same effect. Indeed, whenever he got on the subject of his father’s excellences, he was always enthusiastic. Not without ample reason, I believe, for Mr Bracebridge was a man possessed of very rare qualities; and Oaklands, his place, was one of the most delightful houses to visit at in the country, or probably, in all England; that is to say, young men and boys, and indeed young people, generally, found it so. Ernest knew that it would do poor Ellis a great deal of good to go there. From what he could make out, Ellis’s father and mother were advanced in life and great invalids, and Edward, their only son, had been considerably over-petted and over-coddled, though, as they had a good deal of sense with regard to many important matters, they had not spoilt him. They had corrected him as a child when he deserved it, and watching the growth of bad propensities, had endeavoured to eradicate them before they had attained any size. They were themselves very shy, diffident people, and thinking little of themselves, thought very little of their son, and brought him up to think very little of himself. Certainly, if they erred, they erred on the right side.Ellis was not weak; he was not a boy at all likely to be imposed upon by a bad person; his principles were, as far as could be seen, good, and his sympathies appeared to be always on the right side. Thus he was undoubtedly particularly fortunate in falling in with a boy like Ernest Bracebridge, whom he could admire, and who could, at the same time, enter into his feelings, and take an interest in him. Still Ernest did not think that he was doing anything out of the way in encouraging him. There was something so natural and unpretending about his character, and so free was he from anything like conceit or vanity, that he was scarcely conscious that he was superior to his companions; or, if he was conscious of the fact, that it was anything on which he should be justified in priding himself. Of one thing I am sure, that he had not found out that, by his own force of character and talents, he had already become one of the most popular boys in the school, and that, had he made the experiment, he would have had more followers than any boy even in the first class. The way he had tackled Blackall the evening of the kite-race had become known, though neither he nor Ellis had talked of it; and this gained him many admirers, especially among those over whom the bully was accustomed to tyrannise. At last Blackall began to be twitted with it, even by the fellows of his own age. It became at last a joke among his compeers to ask him how his ears were—how he liked to have an old man of the woods on his back, and how he could allow himself to be thrashed by a fellow half a head shorter than himself, and so much younger. He dared not attack either Ernest or Ellis openly, but he resolved to take his revenge on them as soon as possible. He had not long to wait for an opportunity. Before our drilling lessons were over, Sergeant Dibble used to arm us all with basket-hilted sticks, which served the purpose of broadswords; and, forming in two parties on opposite sides of the parade-ground, we were ordered to advance and attack, and defend ourselves, delivering or receiving so many cuts each time the two lines passed each other. Blackall, who prided himself on being a good swordsman, thought this would be a fine opportunity for inflicting a severe revenge on Bracebridge, whom he dared not now bully as formerly, and kick and cuff whenever he met him.“Now, young gentlemen, prepare for the broadsword exercise,” the Sergeant sung out in his clear, sharp voice. “Fall in line; fall in!”Ellis had begun to learn the broadsword exercise, though it was a sore trial to him, for he found great difficulty in recollecting the proper guards or strokes, and he was always receiving some severe cuts across the head or shoulders or legs, and getting into trouble by giving the wrong strokes, and making his opponents, who were not prepared for them, suffer accordingly. Bracebridge had hit upon a plan to save him somewhat from this, by taking him as his opponent; and when he saw him making the wrong stroke, he was ready with the proper guard; and when he saw that Ellis had not his right guard, he either hit him softly, or hit at the guard presented to him. This was very good practice to Ernest, though it made Sergeant Dibble sing out, every now and then—“Mr Bracebridge! Mr Bracebridge! can you never remember to listen to the word of command, sir? When I say cut two, I often see you cut four; and when I say third guard, you are apt to use the first or second guard. How is this, sir? Mr Ellis, you are not attentive either, sir, permit me to observe. When I say defend, draw up the hand smartly, and from the first guard. Be smart!—second guard! third guard! Remember, if you have a big, ugly fellow, with a sword sharp enough to divide a bolster, who happens to wish to cut your head off, he doesn’t stop to consider which is the right guard to make, or thrust to deliver. He’d whip off your head before you had time to look round, and then what would you think of yourself, I should like to know?”Ernest never replied, while exercising, to these or any similar remarks, but he and Sergeant Dibble soon understood each other, and the Sergeant was convinced that Ernest was a better swordsman than he had supposed.“But, Mr Bracebridge, it will never do to let Mr Ellis go on in that way. Now that he has a little more confidence, we must make him run his chance with the rest,” he urged. “A few cuts with a hazel stick won’t do him any harm, and will make him open his eyes a little.”To this, of course, Ernest agreed, and the present day was one of the first poor Ellis had to look out for himself.Blackall had meantime watched Ernest; and hearing him found fault with, and seeing him and Ellis make a mess of it, as he thought, he held his swordsmanship in very low estimation. This made him confident that he could do what he liked with him. It required some management to get placed opposite to him, but he succeeded, and felt highly delighted at the thoughts of the revenge he was about to enjoy.“Draw swords, gentlemen;” sung out Sergeant Dibble. “Both parties advance. Mr Jones’s party assault with the second cut; Mr Smith’s defend with the second guard. Now hit hard and sharp, gentlemen. If the proper guards are up you can do no harm.” Blackall was in the Jones’s party, and purposed fully to carry out the order. Bracebridge saw that he was opposite to him, and assumed a look of perfect indifference. The bully expected to see him turning pale and looking alarmed. “March!” sung out the Sergeant. “Double quick!”On rushed the two squadrons, for so they could not help fancying themselves, and, as I believe, the Sergeant for the moment fancied them also. They met with a hostile clash. Blackall, not knowing that the Sergeant’s eye was on him, shifted to the third cut, hoping to give Ernest a severe blow across the legs, but Ernest’s eye was as quick as his, and catching the movement of the arm, he had the third guard ready to receive the blow.The Sergeant made no remark, but kept a watch on Blackall’s movements, “Very well, gentlemen; very well!” he exclaimed. “Now let Mr Smith’s party assault with the fourth cut. Bravo! performed with perfect precision.” And so he went on. Each time, however, that Jones’s division had to assault, he saw that Blackall endeavoured to take some undue advantage of Ernest, who with equal regularity contrived quietly to foil him. Ernest kept his eye on his opponent’s, but said nothing, and in no other way showed that he was aware of his evil intentions. Blackall at length began to lose his temper at his own failures: he ground his teeth and turned savage glances towards Bracebridge, who met them with a quiet look, free, at the same time, from scorn or anger. Not once did Blackall succeed in inflicting a blow, and though Ernest at last might have bestowed several very severe ones, he rightly refrained from so doing.“I know perfectly well that even had he hit me, I ought not to have hit him back,” he said to himself; “much more then ought I to refrain when he has not succeeded in his object. I should like to try the plan of heaping coals of fire on his head. I might soften him, but I should have less hope with him than with any one. I will try. It matters not what may happen to me, but I am resolved, at the same time, I will not let him go on bullying any fellow whom I can defend.” When the drill was over, Sergeant Dibble called up Ernest.“I saw it all, sir,” he said. “You did capitally. I never saw a young gentleman keep his temper as you did. Why he wants to hurt you I don’t know, but I will put you up to a trick or two which will place him in your power. You are getting on famously with your fencing. He piques himself on being a first-rate fencer. He is not bad; and he does very well when he fences with Mr Jay, or any one he knows. Now, though I do not teach fencing, I can fence; and, what is more, I have learned several tricks which people do not generally know. I once saved a wounded Frenchman’s life and took him prisoner, and nursed him as I ought to have done, and then I found he was a master of the science of defence and attack. I never saw a man who could use a small sword as he did. Well, as a mark of his gratitude, he taught me all he knew, and, especially, how to disarm an opponent. It is simple, but requires practice. There is no one in the fencing-room; come with me there and I will show it to you. Practise the trick till I come again, whenever you have an opportunity, either by yourself or with a friend you can trust, like Ellis or Buttar. I’ll answer for it that you will be perfect in a couple of weeks at most. If you lead Blackall to it, he is certain to challenge you before long. Disarm him three times running, and I do not think that he’ll ever wish to attack you again in any way.”Ernest could not resist the offer the Sergeant made him. He thought that the knowledge might be of the greatest importance to him during his life, so he at once went with the Sergeant into the fencing-room. “You see, Mr Bracebridge,” observed his instructor, “if you had a real sword in your hand, you would give your opponent such a cut round the wrist that he would probably be unable to hold a weapon again for many a month afterwards.”Ernest set to work at once in his usual way, and Sergeant Dibble taking great pains to instruct him, he quickly acquired the trick.“You see, sir,” observed the Sergeant, “though a foil does not cut, the button, if the leather is off, as I often see is the case, will give a very ugly scratch round the wrist, and if this is repeated two or three times, a fencer will rather stand clear of the man who can do it. Just do you try it on Blackall, and you’ll see if my word don’t come right.”After the Sergeant was gone, Ernest thought over what he had said. He did not, however, half like the idea of taking the advantage which had been given him over Blackall.“No, no!” he exclaimed to himself. “I’ll tell him beforehand what I am going to do. If I was going to engage with him in mortal combat, the matter would be different; I should feel as if I was going to commit a murder; but now I feel as if I was going to inflict on him a very deserved punishment and take down his pride a little.” So Ernest set to work, and practised the trick Sergeant Dibble had taught him. After a day or two he took Buttar and Ellis into his confidence, and they all practised it together. Ellis, however, could not manage to accomplish the turn of the wrist in a way to be effective, but Buttar, who had resolved to be a soldier, and took a deep interest in all military exercises, was never weary in practising it. When Sergeant Dibble came again, he told Ernest that he would be perfect in another week, and complimented Buttar also on his proficiency.Ellis, meantime, was making great advances in the use of the broadsword, and the Sergeant assured him that if he would go on and persevere, he would very soon be far superior to many idle fellows who now sneered at him, and would not practise unless the master was present.

Bracebridge had to press his advice on Ellis more than once before he could induce him to apply for leave to drill and to learn fencing and the broadsword exercise. All these sort of lessons were classed among the extras, so that the Doctor did not insist on the boys learning them unless by the express wish of their parents. If they themselves wished to learn them, they had to write home and get leave. This system, I fancy, made these branches of education far more popular than they would otherwise have been. The several masters, knowing that the number of their pupils depended on the interest they could excite in their respective sciences, did their utmost to make them attractive. They generally succeeded.

Monsieur Malin would, at all events, have been popular. He was a gentleman by birth and by education, of polished manners, and very good-natured, and as everybody liked him, everybody wished to learn French. Old Dibble, our drill-sergeant, was very unlike him in most respects, but still he won all our hearts. He was a kind-hearted man, and had an excellent temper, and he took great pains to teach us our drill and to make us like it. He was the very man to turn us all into soldiers, and, as Bracebridge had said of him, he never grew weary of recounting his deeds of arms to all whom he could find ready to listen. He was a tall man, somewhat stout, with a bald patch on the top of his head, and grey hair and whiskers, a thoroughly soldier-like hooked nose, and fine piercing grey eyes. Good-natured as he was, he would stand no nonsense or any skylarking; and we all agreed that when he was in the army he was certain to have kept all the men under him in capital order.

Our dancing-master was Mr Jay. He was a proficient in his art; and though he might not have been able to jump as high or to spin round on one leg as long as an opera-dancer, he was able to teach us to dance like gentlemen. He was also a professor of fencing and gymnastics, and a very good instructor he was. He understood thoroughly what the human body could do, and what it might do advantageously. He also taught boxing.

The Doctor was a great encourager of all athletic exercises, and allowed all the boys who wished it to take lessons in boxing once a week for half-an-hour at a time. The greater number availed themselves of the permission, and most of the school were very good boxers. The result was that, as a rule, we were a most peaceable set of boys, and I believe that fewer quarrels took place than among any equal number of boys in England. We had a riding-master, who used to come every Saturday with five or six ponies, and give us lessons in a paddock attached to the school-grounds. The Doctor used to say that his wish was to educate our hearts, our minds, and our bodies as far as he had the power, and that he found from experience that the greater variety of instruction he could give us, the more perfectly he could accomplish his object. He himself gave us instruction in swimming. I have described the pond in the grounds. He used a machine something like a large fishing-rod. A belt was fastened round the waist of a young swimmer, and by the belt he was secured to the end of a line hanging from the rod. The Doctor used to stand, rod in hand, and encourage and advise the boy till he gained confidence and knew how to strike out properly. He was anxious to prevent any one from getting into a bad way of striking out, for, as he used to say, it was as difficult to get rid of a bad habit as to acquire a good one. He was, therefore, always waging a deadly warfare against all bad habits from their very commencement, not only with regard to swimming, but in every other action of life. As soon as a boy had learned to strike out properly, he turned him over to the instruction of one of the bigger boys, who had especial charge of him in the water. He had always four or five boys whom he had taught to swim thoroughly well, and he made them swimming-masters. They benefited by having to give instruction to others, and by learning to keep their tempers. Nothing, perhaps, tries the temper so much as having to teach dull or inattentive boys. Blackall had been made one of the swimming-masters, but at the commencement of the bathing season the Doctor called him up, and without a word of explanation told him that he thought fit to dismiss him from the post. He lost, in consequence, several privileges attached to the office. To a person of Blackall’s character, the mode of his dismissal was a considerable punishment. It showed him that the Doctor was aware of some of his misconduct, but of how much he was still left in ignorance, and he had to live on in fear that some more severe punishment was still in store for him. I am glad to say that there were very few other fellows at all like Blackall in the school. There were, of course, some few bullies and blackguards, or who would speedily have become so if left to their own devices, and there were cowards, and boys who carelessly told an untruth, or were addicted to the too common vice of prevarication. There were also vicious boys, or who would have been vicious had they not been watched and restrained. These were exceptions to the general rule. The Doctor’s system, embracing the law of kindness, answered well, and brought forth good fruits.

“Come along, Ellis,” said Ernest, one Saturday afternoon, when he found his friend busily working away at the model of a vessel he was cutting out of a piece of American pine; “there’s Sergeant Dibble in the playground; I’ll take you up to him, and tell him that he must turn you into a soldier before the holidays. He’ll do it if you obey his directions.” Sergeant Dibble was found in the middle of the playground, surrounded by a number of boys, who were listening eagerly to one of his stories with which he was amusing them till the hour to commence had arrived.

“The reason why we conquered was this, young gentlemen,” he was saying. “Every man, from the highest to the lowest, knew his duty and did it. If they didn’t know it and didn’t do it, Lord Wellington sent them about their business, no matter who they were. Remember that when you grow up. Your duty, I take it, is to do your best in whatever station you may be placed; what you are certain will produce the best results and forward the objects in which you are engaged. It is not enough to say, ‘Such were my orders;’ you must try and discover the spirit of your orders. Above all things, you must never be afraid of responsibility. Never be afraid of being found fault with when you know that you’ve done what’s right. I was going to tell you how we crossed the river Douro, in Portugal; how we surprised Marshal Soult, and how Lord Wellington ate the dinner which had been prepared for him and his staff. We very nearly made him and his whole army prisoners, and we followed them up so closely that they had no time to rest till they were clear out of Portugal; but the hour is up. Fall in, young gentlemen; fall in!”

Ernest took this opportunity to go up to the Sergeant and to explain that he would find Ellis a very willing though, perhaps, a very awkward pupil, and begged that he would treat him accordingly, and not suppose that his awkwardness arose from carelessness or idleness.

Sergeant Dibble looked at Ellis for a few moments. “No fear, Master Bracebridge,” he answered; “I’ve made a first-rate soldier out of far worse materials. If he’s the will, he’ll soon get them long arms and legs to do their duty. It’s rather hard work to get a person who has no ear to march in time, but that’s to be overcome by perseverance, and the eye must be made to do the work which the ear cannot. Fall in, Master Ellis, if you please.”

Ellis had no notion of what falling in meant, so he shuffled about from place to place, looking up inquiringly at the Sergeant. “Take your place, I mean, in the awkward squad, Master Ellis.”

“That’s where I shall always have to be,” thought poor Ellis. “Which are the awkwardest squad, Sergeant?” said he, looking up. “It strikes me that I should go there.”

Whatever Ellis thought of himself, there were several other boys just as awkward, or at all events as unapt to learn military manners. Little Eden was one of them, that is to say, he always forgot what he had learned during his previous lesson. Gregson was another. He was not awkward in his movements, but while instruction was going forward he was always thinking of something else. One reason that Bracebridge succeeded so well in whatever he undertook was, that he had the power of concentrating his attention on whatever he was about; in the school-room or play-room, in the cricket-field or on the parade-ground, it was the same. It was his great talent. He had many other talents, and he also had, from his earliest days, been well trained. Had he been an only son, he might have been spoiled, but he had many brothers, and his temper had been tried, and he had been taught to command himself, and while he relied on his own energies for success, to obey his elders and to treat all his fellow-creatures with respect. Sergeant Dibble very soon pronounced him his best drill. The awkward squad had been standing by themselves for some minutes, looking very awkward, indeed, when Sergeant Dibble exclaimed—

“Fall out, Mr Bracebridge, and take charge of that squad. Exercise them in the balance step, and put them through their facings.”

Ernest, not a little proud, obeyed, and while the rest of the young soldiers were marching up and down, taking open order, wheeling to the right or left, and going through a variety of manoeuvres, he placed himself in front of the boys I have described, with others, making altogether about a dozen. His first aim was to awaken them all up. “Attention!” he exclaimed in a sharp tone, which made them all spring up suddenly. He then explained very clearly what he wanted them to do, and put himself in the required attitude, taking care that they all did the same. Very few could not do the balance step. Chivey and other hopping games had taught them that. He kept them at it a very few minutes, and then telling them to practise it by themselves, went on to teach them their facings, explaining the object of each movement. He did it all in so patient and good-natured a manner that every boy in the squad expressed a hope that Bracebridge might be set to teach them again.

“I’ll tell you what we will do; we will work away every day in the week, and when Sergeant Dibble comes next week we will show him what we can do.” The idea was taken up enthusiastically, and even the least apt of the squad made great progress. In two or three weeks they were fully equal to those who had been drilling all the half. Sergeant Dibble was delighted, and foretold that if Master Bracebridge went into the army he would distinguish himself.

“I don’t know what I am to be,” replied Ernest; “I know that I am to do everything I am set to do as well as I can.”

There were some twenty boys or more who were very far from perfect in their drill in the larger squad, and Sergeant Dibble managed to persuade them to put themselves, during the week, under Ernest’s instruction. Some few, at first, kicked at the notion, but finally all agreed to obey his orders on the parade-ground during one hour every day. Others, of their own accord, joined, and in a short time he had quite a large army of volunteers. He spared no pains to perfect them. He got the Sergeant to bring him a “Manual of Drill Instruction,” and every spare moment he spent in studying it attentively.

In a few weeks Ernest’s squad surpassed that composed of the older boys in the accuracy and rapidity of their movement; and Sergeant Dibble, when he came, expressed his astonishment and delight on finding what could be done when all set to work with a will to do it.

Ernest, too, gained great popularity, and many who had before rather envied him now frankly acknowledged his talents and excellent qualities. He himself also behaved very well. He did not set himself up above the rest in consequence of what he had done and the applause he had gained, but the moment the drill was over he became like one of the rest, and took his hat, or his fishing-rod, or his hoop—though, by the by, he was getting rather out of hoops—and went off shouting and laughing with all the merry throng.

The greatest possible change was worked in Ellis. He no longer looked like the same boy. The alteration in his appearance was almost as striking as that which takes place in a country clown caught by a recruiting sergeant, half drunk at a fair, as he rolls on, looking every moment as if he was going to topple over, from public-house to public-house, and when he has been under the drill-sergeant’s hands for a couple of years, and is turned into the trim, active, intelligent soldier. At first, few who saw poor Ellis’s awkward attempts could possibly avoid laughing. How he rolled from side to side; how he stuck out one foot, and changed it again and again, finding that it was the wrong one; how, when the word “to the right-about” was given, he invariably found himself grinning in the face of his left-hand man, unless by good chance the latter had made the same mistake as himself, when he became suddenly inspired with the hope that he had, for a wonder, hit off the right thing. He soon found his hopes disappointed by being summoned to repeat the movement, with a caution to do it correctly. Then, on receiving the order to march, he nearly always started off with his right foot instead of his left, and when he did put out the left, he quickly changed it to the right, under the impression that he must have made a mistake. Still his perseverance was most praiseworthy. Bracebridge had assured him that in time he would become a good soldier if he wished it, and a good soldier he resolved to be, whether he followed up the profession or not. He read as hard as he had ever done, and found time to manufacture all sorts of things, and yet no one practised more than he did drilling, and games, and all sorts of athletic exercises. Before the change I have described was perceptible, the half was nearly over, and the summer holidays were about to begin. I have, in mentioning it, run on somewhat ahead of events. Ernest had advised him to learn to dance and to fence.

“Come, come, you are joking now, old fellow,” was his reply, in his former melancholy tone of voice. “I may learn any rough affair, like drilling and gymnastics, and, perhaps, the broadsword exercises, and learn enough to cut a fellow’s head off; but to hop and skip about to the sound of a fiddle, or to handle a thin bar of steel so as to prevent another fellow with a similar weapon running his into me, is totally beyond my powers. I know that I could not, if I was to try ever so much.”

“So you thought about gymnastics, and so you thought about drilling, and yet you have succeeded very well in both. Remember the motto of our Silver Knight. Push on up the hill; work away at one thing, and then another. It is extraordinary how much may be learnt in a short time, if people will but give their minds to what they are about. I know a good number of things, and I can do a good number of things, and yet I have not spent more hours of my life with a book before me than have most boys of my age; but then, when I have had a book before me, I have been really busy, getting all I could out of it; I have not sat idling and frittering away my time as so many fellows do. I don’t fancy that I cannot do a thing because it is difficult; I always try to find out where the difficulty lies, and then see how I can best get over it. I like difficulties, because I like to conquer them. This world is full of difficulties, which it is the business of men to conquer. A farmer cannot get a field of corn to grow without overcoming difficulties. He must dig up or plough up the ground; he must get rid of the weeds; he must trench it, and after a time manure it; and this he must do year after year, or it will not produce abundantly. And so it is throughout all the works to be done in this world: then why should we expect to get knowledge, to cultivate our minds, to get rid of the weeds growing up constantly in them, without labour, and hard labour, too? Now, I dare say, my dear fellow, you think that I am talking very learnedly, or you may say, very pedantically; but I do not even claim originality for my views. My father pointed them out to me and my brothers long ago. He threw difficulties in our way, and stood by till we overcame them, telling us it was the best practice we could have in the world. I cannot tell you how much we owe to our father. He is the wisest man I ever met. I dare say there are many cleverer people; men who can talk better, and have done more, and have written more, and who are thought much more of in the world; but my brother and I agree, for all that, that he is the wisest, and if not the most talented, which we don’t say he is, that he makes the best use of the talents he has got. You must come and see him one of these days; I would say at once; but I think that you will like him, and that he will like you better by and by. I wrote to him about you, I must confess that, and he put me up to some of the advice I gave you. My brothers and I always write to him just as we write to one another; indeed, we generally pass our letters on to him, because we know that he likes to hear everything that we are doing. We have no secrets from him, as I find some fellows here have. We always go to him for advice about everything. He often tells us to act as we think best, and to let him know what we have done. Sometimes he tells us that he thinks we have acted very judiciously; at other times he tells us that, from the judgment he has been able to form, we ought to have done differently. He has never kept us in what might be called leading-strings; but has placed the same confidence in us that we do in him—that is to say, he knows we want to do what is right. Depend on it, Ellis, there is nothing like having the most perfect confidence between your father and yourself. I assure you that I should be miserable if I had not, and if I did not believe that he is the best friend I have on earth, or ever shall have.”

Bracebridge said a great deal more to the same effect. Indeed, whenever he got on the subject of his father’s excellences, he was always enthusiastic. Not without ample reason, I believe, for Mr Bracebridge was a man possessed of very rare qualities; and Oaklands, his place, was one of the most delightful houses to visit at in the country, or probably, in all England; that is to say, young men and boys, and indeed young people, generally, found it so. Ernest knew that it would do poor Ellis a great deal of good to go there. From what he could make out, Ellis’s father and mother were advanced in life and great invalids, and Edward, their only son, had been considerably over-petted and over-coddled, though, as they had a good deal of sense with regard to many important matters, they had not spoilt him. They had corrected him as a child when he deserved it, and watching the growth of bad propensities, had endeavoured to eradicate them before they had attained any size. They were themselves very shy, diffident people, and thinking little of themselves, thought very little of their son, and brought him up to think very little of himself. Certainly, if they erred, they erred on the right side.

Ellis was not weak; he was not a boy at all likely to be imposed upon by a bad person; his principles were, as far as could be seen, good, and his sympathies appeared to be always on the right side. Thus he was undoubtedly particularly fortunate in falling in with a boy like Ernest Bracebridge, whom he could admire, and who could, at the same time, enter into his feelings, and take an interest in him. Still Ernest did not think that he was doing anything out of the way in encouraging him. There was something so natural and unpretending about his character, and so free was he from anything like conceit or vanity, that he was scarcely conscious that he was superior to his companions; or, if he was conscious of the fact, that it was anything on which he should be justified in priding himself. Of one thing I am sure, that he had not found out that, by his own force of character and talents, he had already become one of the most popular boys in the school, and that, had he made the experiment, he would have had more followers than any boy even in the first class. The way he had tackled Blackall the evening of the kite-race had become known, though neither he nor Ellis had talked of it; and this gained him many admirers, especially among those over whom the bully was accustomed to tyrannise. At last Blackall began to be twitted with it, even by the fellows of his own age. It became at last a joke among his compeers to ask him how his ears were—how he liked to have an old man of the woods on his back, and how he could allow himself to be thrashed by a fellow half a head shorter than himself, and so much younger. He dared not attack either Ernest or Ellis openly, but he resolved to take his revenge on them as soon as possible. He had not long to wait for an opportunity. Before our drilling lessons were over, Sergeant Dibble used to arm us all with basket-hilted sticks, which served the purpose of broadswords; and, forming in two parties on opposite sides of the parade-ground, we were ordered to advance and attack, and defend ourselves, delivering or receiving so many cuts each time the two lines passed each other. Blackall, who prided himself on being a good swordsman, thought this would be a fine opportunity for inflicting a severe revenge on Bracebridge, whom he dared not now bully as formerly, and kick and cuff whenever he met him.

“Now, young gentlemen, prepare for the broadsword exercise,” the Sergeant sung out in his clear, sharp voice. “Fall in line; fall in!”

Ellis had begun to learn the broadsword exercise, though it was a sore trial to him, for he found great difficulty in recollecting the proper guards or strokes, and he was always receiving some severe cuts across the head or shoulders or legs, and getting into trouble by giving the wrong strokes, and making his opponents, who were not prepared for them, suffer accordingly. Bracebridge had hit upon a plan to save him somewhat from this, by taking him as his opponent; and when he saw him making the wrong stroke, he was ready with the proper guard; and when he saw that Ellis had not his right guard, he either hit him softly, or hit at the guard presented to him. This was very good practice to Ernest, though it made Sergeant Dibble sing out, every now and then—

“Mr Bracebridge! Mr Bracebridge! can you never remember to listen to the word of command, sir? When I say cut two, I often see you cut four; and when I say third guard, you are apt to use the first or second guard. How is this, sir? Mr Ellis, you are not attentive either, sir, permit me to observe. When I say defend, draw up the hand smartly, and from the first guard. Be smart!—second guard! third guard! Remember, if you have a big, ugly fellow, with a sword sharp enough to divide a bolster, who happens to wish to cut your head off, he doesn’t stop to consider which is the right guard to make, or thrust to deliver. He’d whip off your head before you had time to look round, and then what would you think of yourself, I should like to know?”

Ernest never replied, while exercising, to these or any similar remarks, but he and Sergeant Dibble soon understood each other, and the Sergeant was convinced that Ernest was a better swordsman than he had supposed.

“But, Mr Bracebridge, it will never do to let Mr Ellis go on in that way. Now that he has a little more confidence, we must make him run his chance with the rest,” he urged. “A few cuts with a hazel stick won’t do him any harm, and will make him open his eyes a little.”

To this, of course, Ernest agreed, and the present day was one of the first poor Ellis had to look out for himself.

Blackall had meantime watched Ernest; and hearing him found fault with, and seeing him and Ellis make a mess of it, as he thought, he held his swordsmanship in very low estimation. This made him confident that he could do what he liked with him. It required some management to get placed opposite to him, but he succeeded, and felt highly delighted at the thoughts of the revenge he was about to enjoy.

“Draw swords, gentlemen;” sung out Sergeant Dibble. “Both parties advance. Mr Jones’s party assault with the second cut; Mr Smith’s defend with the second guard. Now hit hard and sharp, gentlemen. If the proper guards are up you can do no harm.” Blackall was in the Jones’s party, and purposed fully to carry out the order. Bracebridge saw that he was opposite to him, and assumed a look of perfect indifference. The bully expected to see him turning pale and looking alarmed. “March!” sung out the Sergeant. “Double quick!”

On rushed the two squadrons, for so they could not help fancying themselves, and, as I believe, the Sergeant for the moment fancied them also. They met with a hostile clash. Blackall, not knowing that the Sergeant’s eye was on him, shifted to the third cut, hoping to give Ernest a severe blow across the legs, but Ernest’s eye was as quick as his, and catching the movement of the arm, he had the third guard ready to receive the blow.

The Sergeant made no remark, but kept a watch on Blackall’s movements, “Very well, gentlemen; very well!” he exclaimed. “Now let Mr Smith’s party assault with the fourth cut. Bravo! performed with perfect precision.” And so he went on. Each time, however, that Jones’s division had to assault, he saw that Blackall endeavoured to take some undue advantage of Ernest, who with equal regularity contrived quietly to foil him. Ernest kept his eye on his opponent’s, but said nothing, and in no other way showed that he was aware of his evil intentions. Blackall at length began to lose his temper at his own failures: he ground his teeth and turned savage glances towards Bracebridge, who met them with a quiet look, free, at the same time, from scorn or anger. Not once did Blackall succeed in inflicting a blow, and though Ernest at last might have bestowed several very severe ones, he rightly refrained from so doing.

“I know perfectly well that even had he hit me, I ought not to have hit him back,” he said to himself; “much more then ought I to refrain when he has not succeeded in his object. I should like to try the plan of heaping coals of fire on his head. I might soften him, but I should have less hope with him than with any one. I will try. It matters not what may happen to me, but I am resolved, at the same time, I will not let him go on bullying any fellow whom I can defend.” When the drill was over, Sergeant Dibble called up Ernest.

“I saw it all, sir,” he said. “You did capitally. I never saw a young gentleman keep his temper as you did. Why he wants to hurt you I don’t know, but I will put you up to a trick or two which will place him in your power. You are getting on famously with your fencing. He piques himself on being a first-rate fencer. He is not bad; and he does very well when he fences with Mr Jay, or any one he knows. Now, though I do not teach fencing, I can fence; and, what is more, I have learned several tricks which people do not generally know. I once saved a wounded Frenchman’s life and took him prisoner, and nursed him as I ought to have done, and then I found he was a master of the science of defence and attack. I never saw a man who could use a small sword as he did. Well, as a mark of his gratitude, he taught me all he knew, and, especially, how to disarm an opponent. It is simple, but requires practice. There is no one in the fencing-room; come with me there and I will show it to you. Practise the trick till I come again, whenever you have an opportunity, either by yourself or with a friend you can trust, like Ellis or Buttar. I’ll answer for it that you will be perfect in a couple of weeks at most. If you lead Blackall to it, he is certain to challenge you before long. Disarm him three times running, and I do not think that he’ll ever wish to attack you again in any way.”

Ernest could not resist the offer the Sergeant made him. He thought that the knowledge might be of the greatest importance to him during his life, so he at once went with the Sergeant into the fencing-room. “You see, Mr Bracebridge,” observed his instructor, “if you had a real sword in your hand, you would give your opponent such a cut round the wrist that he would probably be unable to hold a weapon again for many a month afterwards.”

Ernest set to work at once in his usual way, and Sergeant Dibble taking great pains to instruct him, he quickly acquired the trick.

“You see, sir,” observed the Sergeant, “though a foil does not cut, the button, if the leather is off, as I often see is the case, will give a very ugly scratch round the wrist, and if this is repeated two or three times, a fencer will rather stand clear of the man who can do it. Just do you try it on Blackall, and you’ll see if my word don’t come right.”

After the Sergeant was gone, Ernest thought over what he had said. He did not, however, half like the idea of taking the advantage which had been given him over Blackall.

“No, no!” he exclaimed to himself. “I’ll tell him beforehand what I am going to do. If I was going to engage with him in mortal combat, the matter would be different; I should feel as if I was going to commit a murder; but now I feel as if I was going to inflict on him a very deserved punishment and take down his pride a little.” So Ernest set to work, and practised the trick Sergeant Dibble had taught him. After a day or two he took Buttar and Ellis into his confidence, and they all practised it together. Ellis, however, could not manage to accomplish the turn of the wrist in a way to be effective, but Buttar, who had resolved to be a soldier, and took a deep interest in all military exercises, was never weary in practising it. When Sergeant Dibble came again, he told Ernest that he would be perfect in another week, and complimented Buttar also on his proficiency.

Ellis, meantime, was making great advances in the use of the broadsword, and the Sergeant assured him that if he would go on and persevere, he would very soon be far superior to many idle fellows who now sneered at him, and would not practise unless the master was present.

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