did not hear low moanings from one or both of
the dormitories, and thus knew that one, sometimes two or three, were
incarcerated there "on dry bread" for twenty-four hours.

Once we questioned a victim, our interrogation-points assuming the shape
of huge wedges of bread and jam.

"We are sent here on dry bread for missing our lessons, for having our
shoes untied, for saying 'Yes' instead of 'Yes, Miss Sally,' for
everything we do. I am sometimes three days of the week on dry bread."

"Why don't you write to your papa?" blurted a young American of wrathful
turkey-cock aspect.

"Oh, I never had any papa," answered the poor child simply, "and I don't
know where mamma lives."

Alas! this innocent remark expressed volumes. We knew that most of the
poor creatures "had no papa and didn't know where mamma lived," that
they were mere jetsam and flotsam thrown up on this quiet shore from the
waves of the great ocean of London and forgotten by all the world save
those whose business it was to pay and to receive the twenty pounds a
year which was their sole importance.

Of course the best of St. John's belonged to the lodgers, and the best
was delightful to tastes that prefer picturesqueness with moderate
comfort to smug and dapper luxury. Miss Betsy did our cooking, the
school-girls waited upon our table, the boys blacked our boots,
"Mam'zel," the French governess from Kilkenny, made our beds when there
was no servant, as often happened, birds nested in the ivy of our
latticed windows, bees floated up from the fragrant meadows below to hum
us to our afternoon naps, and our table-cloth we shook every day
ourselves, having a deep purpose in refusing to allow it to be shaken by
other hands.

It somehow always happened that the children's recess coincided with
that white fluttering from our diamonded window.

One day, when we first came to St. John's, we heard two quiet whispers
at the ivy's roots:

"Sometimes um shakes out bread-'n'-butter."

"'N' sometimes um shakes out _tart_!"

"O-o-o!" answered the first whisper. "_Tart?_ Truly _tart_?"

"Bet yer heye! One day I hadn't had nothink to heat all day, an' I was
a-'idin' 'ere, 'cos Miss Sally howed me a trouncin'. I were just
a-starvin'; an' I said to myself, 'Good Lord, don't I jest wish I had
a-somethin' to heat!' Jest then, bang came a great piece o' goose-berry
tart right on to my 'ead!"

"_Tart!_" murmured the first whisper, in utter amazement. "_Tart!_ Do ye
s'p