few years older than himself, who was the leader of all the games
played around the big rock in the open field.

XI

Quite a gang of boys gathered daily about the big rock, generally on the
farther side of it where they could not be seen from the house. Beyond
the rock in that direction was nothing but an open field, and then the
woods, rarely disturbed by a visitor. Thus they were really more safe
than indoors as no one could approach them without being detected while
still far away.

The two sons of the sexton were there, and a couple of boys from the
city besides Keith, and three or four sons of neighbouring farmers. They
ranged in ages from eight to eleven or twelve. Keith was the baby, but
this was never held up against him. He was commonly treated as an equal,
which raised his self-confidence tremendously, but it had also a
somewhat embarrassing effect when the others seemed to take for granted
that he knew as much as they concerning the matters that most occupied
their minds--to judge by their talk at least.

The oldest of the lot, and their undisputed leader, was a peasant boy of
remarkable ugliness, squint-eyed and snub-nosed, with tufts of yellow
hair always falling over his face and several teeth missing. His clothes
were in rags and he never wore shoes. He boasted of never washing unless
"the old one" stood over him with a stick, and his language was worse
than both his manners and his looks. An unbroken stream of profanity
and obscenity poured from his rarely silent mouth, and he heaped
withering scorn on any attempt at decent speech.

Keith had now and then picked up questionable words while playing in the
lane where he lived. Johan sported some of them in moments of furious
rebellion against his mother's "holiness," as he called it. Once or
twice Keith had repeated such words at home and suffered for it. Soon he
learned to know the type at first hearing, and he disliked this part of
the vocabulary even when he could use it without danger to himself. He
developed a greater daintiness in words than in anything else, but this
summer formed an exception. The force of suggestion brought to bear on
him was too overwhelming, and he strove boldly to vie with the rest in
foulness of tongue and thought. As soon as he was back in the city, this
habit dropped off him as the soap lather is washed off a bather when he
dives into the clear waters of a lake. But the game he had learned to
play back of the big r