, pause and beware.
The knowledge of evil is ruin, and the continuance in it is moral death.
That little matter--that beginning of evil--it will be like the
snowflake detached by the breath of air from the mountain-top, which, as
it rushes down, gains size and strength and impetus, till it has swollen
to the mighty and irresistible avalanche that overwhelms garden and
field and village in a chaos of undistinguishable death.

Kibroth-Hattaavah! Many and many a young Englishman has perished there!
Many and many a happy English boy, the jewel of his mother's heart--
brave and beautiful and strong--lies buried there. Very pale their
shadows rise before us--the shadows of our young brothers who have
sinned and suffered. From the sea and the sod, from foreign graves and
English churchyards, they start up and throng around us in the paleness
of their fall. May every schoolboy who reads this page be warned by the
waving of their wasted hands, from that burning marle of passion where
they found nothing but shame and ruin, polluted affections, and an early
grave.

VOLUME ONE, CHAPTER TEN.

DORMITORY LIFE.

Aspasie trillistos epeluthe nux erebenne.--_Homer_.

For a few days after the Sunday walk narrated in the last chapter Upton
and Eric cut each other dead. Upton was angry at Eric's declining the
honour of his company, and Eric was piqued at Upton's unreasonableness.
In the "taking up" system, such quarrels were of frequent occurrence,
and as the existence of a misunderstanding was generally indicated in
this very public way, the variations of good-will between such friends
generally excited no little notice and amusement among the other boys.
But both Upton and Eric were too sensible to carry their differences so
far as others similarly circumstanced; each thoroughly enjoyed the
other's company, and they generally seized an early opportunity for
effecting a reconciliation, which united them more firmly than ever.

As soon as Eric had got over his little pique, he made the first
advances by writing a note to Upton, which he slipped under his study
door, and which ran as follows--

"Dear Horace,--Don't let us quarrel about nothing. Silly fellow, why
should you be angry with me because for once I wanted to go a walk
with Russell, who, by the bye, is twice as good a fellow as you? I
shall expect you to make it up directly after prayers.--Yours, if you
are not silly, EW."

The consequence was, that a