shamed of my rudeness than if he had fired up at my
ridicule.

"And so you live all together here?" said Whiskerandos; "this farmer,
his wife, the two boys, and you?"

"Yes, and we are as happy as the day is long."

"Humph!" said Whiskerandos; "I should prefer my wild freedom; but it is
different, I suppose, with man. And as for you, Oddity, you were never
like other rats; you were always intended for a watch-dog. And you
really guard that can and parcel for hours, and resist the temptation to
nibble?"

"I am trusted," was the simple reply.

"Now, Oddity," said I, "I should much like to see you in your new home,
surrounded by all your human companions."

"Yonder is my master's house," answered Oddity, pointing across the
field with his nose. "You have but to clamber up to the window in the
evening, and peep through the clustering roses, and you will see us all
there together."

"I'll have a peep," said Whiskerandos, "and then off to old London
again!"

"You must take nothing from my master's house," cried Oddity.

"Not a potato paring!" laughed our valiant companion.

"And now I would advise you to be off," said my brother; "here's my
master coming for his dinner."

Away we scampered at full speed, my light-footed comrade and I; for well
we knew what was certain to be our fate if caught even by the
kind-hearted farmer. We were only rats after all.

[* In the course of a single year no less than _two thousand nine
hundred and eighty-one pounds_ were honestly earned in this manner
by 132 boys connected with ragged schools!]

CHAPTER XXIII.

A PEEP THROUGH THE ROSES.

That night, when the round harvest moon was throwing her soft light on
the earth, we climbed up the rose-tree by the window, and, quietly
pushing aside the fragrant flowers, peeped in upon such a scene as
rarely meets the eye of a rat.

There was a neat little kitchen, with a sanded floor and white-washed
walls, so clean, so perfectly clean, that not even the sharp eyes of the
race of Mus could have detected a speck upon them. Rows of plates lined
the shelves on the wall, pans burnished till they shone like silver,
a framed sampler hung over the mantelpiece, and a large clock merrily
ticked behind the door. Near the wide hearth there was a table, on which
a substantial supper was spread on a cloth white as new-fallen snow.

Round this table were seated the farmer, his wife, and our two old
friends, Bob and Billy, i