pered
through the keyhole that Mr. Murdstone was going to send him away the
next day to a school near London.

The next morning he started in a carrier's cart. His mother was so much
in awe of Mr. Murdstone that she hardly dared kiss David good-by, and he
saw nothing of Peggotty. But as he was crying, Peggotty came running
from behind a hedge and jumped into the cart and hugged him so hard that
all the buttons flew off the back of her dress.

The man who drove the cart was named Barkis. He seemed to be very much
taken with Peggotty, and after she had gone back David told him all
about her. Before they parted he made David promise to write her a
message for him. It was a very short message--"Barkis is willin'." David
didn't know in the least what the driver meant, but he promised, and he
sent the message in his very first letter.

Probably Peggotty knew what he meant, though, for before David came back
again Mr. Barkis and she were courting. However, that has not much to do
with this part of the story.

The school to which Mr. Murdstone had sent him was a bare building with
gratings on all the windows like a prison, and a high brick wall around
it. It was owned by a man named Creakle, who had begun by raising hops,
and had gone into the school business because he had lost all of his own
and his wife's money and had no other way to live. He was fat and spoke
always in a whisper, and he was so cruel and bad-tempered that not only
the boys, but his wife, too, was terribly afraid of him.

He nearly twisted David's ear off the first day, and he made one of the
teachers tie a placard to David's back (this, he said, was by Mr.
Murdstone's order) which read:

____________________
| |
| TAKE CARE OF HIM |
| HE BITES |
|____________________|

To have to wear this before everybody made David sorrowful and ashamed,
but luckily a good-natured boy named Tommy Traddles, who liked David's
looks, said it was a shame to make him wear it, and as Tommy Traddles
was very popular, all the other boys said it was a shame, too. So,
beyond calling him "Towser" for a few days, and saying "Lie down, sir!"
as if he were a dog, they did not make much fun of him while he wore it.

Besides Tommy Traddles, David liked best the head boy, James
Steerforth--the oldest boy in the school, and the only one Creakle did
not dare beat or mistreat. Steerforth took David under his wing and
helped him