od people who, aware of the harsh, unnatural
feeling of the surly old gardener towards his grandson, were anxious to
befriend the orphan child--Squire Turner of Firgrove, the father of Aunt
Catharine and Auntie Alice, being among the number. But the first thing
they one and all proposed was that for a while he should be sent to
school, and to this the lad resolutely refused to submit. Did he not
know what strong, active boys who could leap, and run, and fight, and
play football were like out of school? They were his enemies, his
tormentors, who mocked, gibed, jeered, stoned him even, until he
sometimes felt he would like to wrap his long arms round their necks and
strangle the whole lot of them. And if they were cruel and unkind out of
school, when he could generally get away from them somehow, or hide,
what would they be in it where there should be no escape? School indeed!
Not likely! So in order to free himself from the attentions of those who
meant well enough, no doubt, but, in the dwarf's opinion, did not know
what they were talking about, Bambo did what many another boy has done
on the top of his temper before and since--he ran away, far, far away to
the big town of Barchester, upon which he and the children had just
turned their backs, tramping every step of the long, weary journey.

It was quickly made plain to him, however, that most of the lads who
loafed about the Barchester street corners were curiously similar to the
boys of Firdale in their love of teasing and making a mock of any
creature weaker than themselves, any one whose appearance or
peculiarities presented a fair butt for their rough ridicule, and
gradually the dwarf grew to cherish a rooted hatred to his race.

The days went on. He had arrived in Barchester with only a
long-treasured threepenny piece in his pocket. Rapidly it melted away;
for a few pence do not last very long, even when one buys only a
halfpenny worth of bread a day and sleeps on a doorstep. He was almost
famished and worn to a shadow when, by good luck or ill, he fell in with
the proprietor of the Satellite Circus Company and his troupe, as Joe so
grandly called the occupants of the huge yellow caravan. They were just
starting on tour--the phrase is Joe's--for the summer. Joe eagerly
invited the dwarf to accompany them, being on the lookout at the time
for a fresh sensation, and seeing in the extraordinary-looking lad, with
the huge head, stunted legs, and sprawling feet, a nove