r
folly in seeking for a superior education for her protege; nay, she even
vented upon the sacred head of MacGrawler himself her dissatisfaction
at the results of his instructions. In like manner, when a man who
can spell comes to be hanged, the anti-educationists accuse the
spelling-book of his murder. High words between the admirer of ignorant
innocence and the propagator of intellectual science ensued, which ended
in MacGrawler's final expulsion from the Mug.

There are some young gentlemen of the present day addicted to the
adoption of Lord Byron's poetry, with the alteration of new rhymes, who
are pleased graciously to inform us that they are born to be the ruin of
all those who love them,--an interesting fact, doubtless, but which they
might as well keep to themselves. It would seem by the contents of this
chapter as if the same misfortune were destined to Paul. The exile of
MacGrawler, the insults offered to Dummie Dunnaker,--alike occasioned by
him,--appear to sanction that opinion. Unfortunately, though Paul was a
poet, he was not much of a sentimentalist; and he has never given us the
edifying ravings of his remorse on those subjects. But MacGrawler, like
Dunnaker, was resolved that our hero should perceive the curse of his
fatality; and as he still retained some influence over the mind of
his quondam pupil, his accusations against Paul, as the origin of
his banishment, were attended with a greater success than were the
complaints of Dummie Dunnaker on a similar calamity. Paul, who, like
most people who are good for nothing, had an excellent heart, was
exceedingly grieved at MacGrawler's banishment on his account; and he
endeavoured to atone for it by such pecuniary consolations as he was
enabled to offer. These MacGrawler (purely, we may suppose, from a
benevolent desire to lessen the boy's remorse) scrupled not to accept;
and thus, so similar often are the effects of virtue and of vice, the
exemplary MacGrawler conspired with the unprincipled Long Ned and the
heartless Henry Finish in producing that unenviable state of vacuity
which now saddened over the pockets of Paul.

As our hero was slowly walking towards the sage's abode, depending
on his gratitude and friendship for a temporary shelter, one of those
lightning flashes of thought which often illumine the profoundest abyss
of affliction darted across his mind. Recalling the image of the critic,
he remembered that he had seen that ornament of "The Asinae