n the midst
of the cloisters that run along the side of the playground of Slaughter
House School, near Smithfield, London. It was there, madam, that your
humble servant had the honour of acquiring, after six years' labour,
that immense fund of classical knowledge which in after life has been so
exceedingly useful to him.

The circumstances of the quarrel were these:--Biggs, the gown-boy (a
man who, in those days, I thought was at least seven feet high, and was
quite thunderstruck to find in after life that he measured no more than
five feet four), was what we called "second cock" of the school; the
first cock was a great big, good-humoured, lazy, fair-haired fellow,
Old Hawkins by name, who, because he was large and good-humoured, hurt
nobody. Biggs, on the contrary, was a sad bully; he had half-a-dozen
fags, and beat them all unmercifully. Moreover, he had a little brother,
a boarder in Potky's house, whom, as a matter of course, he hated and
maltreated worse than anyone else.

Well, one day, because young Biggs had not brought his brother his
hoops, or had not caught a ball at cricket, or for some other equally
good reason, Biggs the elder so belaboured the poor little fellow, that
Berry, who was sauntering by, and saw the dreadful blows which the
elder brother was dealing to the younger with his hockey-stick, felt
a compassion for the little fellow (perhaps he had a jealousy against
Biggs, and wanted to try a few rounds with him, but that I can't vouch
for); however, Berry passing by, stopped and said, "Don't you think
you have thrashed the boy enough, Biggs?" He spoke this in a very civil
tone, for he never would have thought of interfering rudely with the
sacred privilege that an upper boy at a public school always has of
beating a junior, especially when they happen to be brothers.

The reply of Biggs, as might be expected, was to hit young Biggs with
the hockey-stick twice as hard as before, until the little wretch howled
with pain. "I suppose it's no business of yours, Berry," said Biggs,
thumping away all the while, and laid on worse and worse.

Until Berry (and, indeed, little Biggs) could bear it no longer, and the
former, bouncing forward, wrenched the stick out of old Biggs's hands,
and sent it whirling out of the cloister window, to the great wonder of
a crowd of us small boys, who were looking on. Little boys always like
to see a little companion of their own soundly beaten.

"There!" said Berry, loo