y with a smaller apartment beyond, whose
sides, I observed on entering within, were buttressed from floor to
ceiling with a series of diminutive square wooden chests, ranged along
the walls on top of one another, like the deed boxes noticeable in the
private office of a solicitor in large practice, and all numbered in
similar fashion, seriatim, with large black figures on their front
faces.

"Every boy has one of these lockers to stow his traps in," explained
Tom, "and Smiley said you could have 31, next to mine, which is 30--just
in the same way, old fellow, as our beds are alongside--good of him,
isn't it?"

"Yes," I replied, "he seems a kind chap."

"He is," said Tom; "but, come, Martin, if your box is here you'd better
bundle in your things at once, and leave it out on the landing for the
old woman to take down again to the cellar, where all our trunks and
such-like are kept."

My box was soon found; and my scanty wardrobe being quickly removed to
the numbered receptacle allotted to me, Tom and I returned to the
dormitory, where, as I had taken care to bring back with me the garment
I required for present exigencies, we both soon made an end of our
toilets and jumped into our respective beds.

I had expected that as soon as all the boys were under the sheets, the
mathematical master would have left the room; but, no, "Smiley," much to
my surprise, proceeded to undress, and occupy a large bed at the end of
the dormitory close to the entrance.

Under these circumstances, therefore, instead of the row that would
otherwise have gone on, in the absence of any presiding genius of order,
the room was soon hushed in quiet repose; and, the last thing I can
recollect hearing, ere dropping to sleep, after wishing Tom a _sotto
voce_ "good night," was the sound of the many-voiced sea as the waves
whispered to each other on the beach--the gentle lullaby noise it made,
to the fancy of my cockney ears, exactly resembling that created by the
distant traffic of the London streets in the early hours of the morning
to those living within the city radius.

CHAPTER FIVE.

A SECRET CONSPIRACY.

I awoke from a confused dream of having a quarrel with Aunt Matilda at
Tapioca Villa about taking the tea-tray up to the parlour, and, in my
passion at being condemned to exercise Molly's functions, kicking over
the whole equipage, and sending all the cups and saucers flying down the
kitchen stairs--where I could hear them clatterin