certain standing were included among the Bailie's
customers, and the sight of the Countess of Kilspindie's carriage at his
door marked out his province of business. Yet if a little lassie
stumbled into the shop and asked for a pennyworth of peppermints, he
would order her to be served, adding a peppermint or two more, and some
good advice which sent away the little woman much impressed; for though
the Bailie committed one big, blazing indiscretion, and suffered
terribly in consequence thereof, he was a good and honest man.

The Bailie made only one public mistake in his life, but it was on the
largest scale, and every one wondered that a man so sagacious should
have deliberately entered into a feud with the boys of the Seminary. The
Bailie had battled in turn with the Licensed Victuallers, who as a
fighting body are not to be despised, and with the Teetotalers, whom
every wise man who loves peace of mind leaves alone; with the Tories,
who were his opponents, and with the Liberals, his own party, when he
happened to disagree with them; with the Town Council, whom he
vanquished, and with the Salmon Fishery Board, whom he brought to terms;
but all those battles were as nothing to a campaign with the boys. There
is all the difference in the world between a war with regulars,
conducted according to the rules of military science, and a series of
guerilla skirmishes, wherein all the chances are with the alert and
light-armed enemy. Any personage who goes to war with boys is bound to
be beaten, for he may threaten and attack, but he can hardly ever hurt
them, and never possibly can conquer them; and they will buzz round him
like wasps, will sting him and then be off, will put him to shame before
the public, will tease him on his most sensitive side, will lie in wait
for him in unexpected places with an ingenuity and a perseverance and a
mercilessness which are born of the Devil, who in such matters is the
unfailing ally of all genuine boys.

It was no doubt annoying to a person of the Bailie's dignity and
orderliness to see the terrace in which the Seminary stood, and which
had the honour of containing his residence, turned into a playground,
and outrageous that Jock Howieson, playing rounders in front of a
magistrate's residence, should send the ball crack through the
plate-glass window of a magistrate's dining-room. It was fearsome
conduct on the part of Jock, and even the ball itself should have known
better; but the Bailie