e is not properly
formed;' and then she stroked his neck and smoothed the
feathers."--_The Ugly Duckling_.

Towards the end of June, Queen Mab wrote asking the two boys to come
over for their usual half-term holiday.

"I'm not going," said Jack.

"Why not?" asked Valentine, astonished that any one should decline an
invitation to Brenlands. "Why ever not? You'd have a jolly time; Aunt
Mabel's awfully kind."

"I daresay she is, but I never go visiting. I hate all that sort of
thing."

It was no good trying to make Jack Fenleigh alter his mind; he stuck to
his resolution, and Valentine went to Brenlands alone.

"I'm sorry Jack wouldn't come with you," said Queen Mab on the Saturday
evening; "why was it? Aren't you and he on good terms with each other?"

"Oh, yes, aunt, we're friendly enough in one way, but we don't seem
able to hit it off very well together."

"How is that?"

"Oh, I don't know. I'm not his sort; I suppose I'm too quiet for him."

"I always thought you were noisy enough," answered Miss Fenleigh
laughing.

"You wouldn't, if you knew some of our fellows," returned the boy.

The weeks slipped by, the holidays were approaching, and the far-off
haven of home could almost, as it were, be seen with the naked eye.
Whether the disastrous termination to the dormitory sports had really
served as a warning to Jack to put some restraint upon his wayward
inclinations, it would be difficult to say; but certainly since the
affair of the obstacle race he had managed to keep clear of the
headmaster's study, and had only indulged in such minor acts of
disorder as were the natural consequences of his friendship with
Garston, Rosher, and Teal. It needed the firm hand of Mr. Rowlands to
hold in check the sporting element which at this period was,
unfortunately, rather strong in the Upper Fourth, and which, at certain
times--as for instance during the French lessons--attempted to turn the
very highroad to learning into a second playground.

Monsieur Durand, whose duty it was to instil a knowledge of his
graceful mother tongue into the minds of a score of restless and
unappreciative young Britons, found the facetious gentlemen of the
Upper Fourth a decided "handful." They seemed to regard instruction in
the Gallic language as an unending source of merriment. Garston threw
such an amount of eloquence into the reading of the sentence, "My
cousin has lost the hat of the gardener," that every one sighed to