e can be imparted in a
private lesson!'

Boddy sprang half up from his seat. 'Row, sir, and don't talk,' he
growled.

'Sit, sir, and don't dance in the boat, if you please, or the lady will
be overset,' said Heriot.

Julia requested to be allowed to land and walk home. Boddy caught the
rudder lines and leapt on the bank to hand her out; then all the boys
in her boat and in Catman's shouted, 'Miss Julia! dear Miss Julia, don't
leave us!' and we heard wheedling voices: 'Don't go off with him alone!'
Julia bade us behave well or she would not be able to come out with us.
At her entreaty Boddy stepped back to his post, and the two boats went
forward like swans that have done ruffling their feathers.

The boys were exceedingly disappointed that no catastrophe followed
the events of the day. Heriot, they thought, might have upset the boat,
saved Julia, and drowned Boddy, and given us a feast of pleasurable
excitement: instead of which Boddy lived to harass us with his
tyrannical impositions and spiteful slaps, and it was to him, not to our
Heriot, that Julia was most gracious. Some of us discussed her conduct.

'She's a coquette,' said little Temple. I went off to the French
dictionary.

'Is Julia Rippenger a coquette, Heriot?' I asked him.

'Keep girls out of your heads, you little fellows,' said he, dealing me
a smart thump.

'Is a coquette a nasty girl?' I persisted.

'No, a nice one, as it happens,' was his answer.

My only feeling was jealousy of the superior knowledge of the sex
possessed by Temple, for I could not fathom the meaning of coquette;
but he had sisters. Temple and I walked the grounds together, mutually
declaring how much we would forfeit for Heriot's sake. By this time my
Sunday visits to Julia had been interdicted: I was plunged, as it
were, in the pit of the school, and my dreams of my father were losing
distinctness. A series of boxes on the ears from Boddy began to astound
and transform me. Mr. Rippenger, too, threatened me with carvings,
though my offences were slight. 'Yes,' said Temple and I, in chorus,
'but you daren't strike Heriot!' This was our consolation, and the
sentiment of the school. Fancy, then, our amazement to behold him
laying the cane on Heriot's shoulders as fiercely as he could, and Boddy
seconding him. The scene was terrible. We were all at our desks doing
evening tasks for the morrow, a great matchday at cricket, Boddy
watching over us, and bellowing, 'Silence at your