avoided, was not gentlemanly, but in this case he could
not get out of it.

He and Danny went at each other with their fists clenched, a crowd of
other boys looking on, and urging one or the other to do their best,
for both Danny and Bert had friends, though Bert was the best liked.

Danny struck Bert several times, and Bert hit back, once hitting Danny
in the eye. Bert's lip was cut, and when the fight was over both boys
did not look very nice. But everyone said Bert had the best of it.

"Oh, Bert!" exclaimed his mother, when he came home after the trouble
with Danny. "You've been fighting!"

"Yes, mother, I have," he admitted. "I'm sorry, but I couldn't help
it. Danny Rugg hit me first. I couldn't run away, could I?"

It was a hard question for a mother to answer. No mother likes to
think her son a coward, and that was what the boys would have called
Bert had he not stood up to Danny.

"I--I just had to!" continued Bert. "And I beat him, anyhow, mother."

Mrs. Bobbsey cried a little, and then she made the best of it, and
bathed Bert's cut lip and bruised forehead. She told his father about
it, too, and Mr. Bobbsey, after hearing the account, asked:

"Who won?"

"Well, Bert says he did?"

"Um. Well, I've no doubt but what he did. He's getting quite strong."

"Oh, Richard!" exclaimed Mrs. Bobbsey, in dismay.

"Well, boys will er--have their little troubles," said her husband.
"I'm sorry Bert had to fight, but I'm glad he wasn't a coward. But he
mustn't fight any more."

Then Mr. Bobbsey sat down to read the evening paper.

The weather was getting cooler. Several nights there had been heavy
frosts, and for some time the papers had been saying that it was going
to snow, but the white flakes did not sift down from the sky.

Thanksgiving was approaching. It was the end of the Fall term of
school, and there were to be examinations to see who would pass into
the next higher classes for the Winter season.

Of course in the case of Freddie and Flossie, who were still in the
kindergarten, the examinations were not very hard, but they were soon
to go into the regular primary class, where they would learn to read.
And both the twins were very anxious for this. Bert and Nan had
somewhat harder lessons to do, and they had to answer more difficult
questions in the examinations.

But I am glad to say that all of the Bobbsey twins were promoted, and
Freddie and Flossie came home very proud to tell that