oir--are holding a hot discussion.

Lovat, the eldest son, being the handsomest and by far the most
scampish of the children, is of course his mother's idol. His master,
however, having written to say that up to this, in spite of all the
trouble that has been taken with him, he has evinced a far greater
disposition for cricket and punching his companions' heads than for his
Greek and Latin, Lovat's father had given it as his opinion that Lovat
deserves a right good flogging; while Lovat's mother maintains that all
noble, high-spirited boys are "just like that," and asks Mr.
Massereene, with the air of a Q. C., whether he never felt a distaste
for the dead languages.

Mr. Massereene replying that he never did, that he was always a model
boy, and never anywhere but at the head of his class, his wife
instantly declares she doesn't believe a word of it, and most unfairly
rakes up a dead-and-gone story, in which Mr. Massereene figures as the
principal feature, and is discovered during school hours on the top of
a neighbor's apple-tree, with a long-suffering but irate usher at the
foot of it, armed with his indignation and a birch rod.

"And for three mortal hours he stood there, while I sat up aloft
grinning at him," says Mr. Massereene, with (considering his years) a
disgraceful appreciation of his past immoral conduct; "and when at last
the gardener was induced to mount the tree and drag me ignominiously to
the ground, I got such a flogging as made a chair for some time assume
the character of a rack."

"And you deserved it, too," says Letitia, with unwonted severity.

"I did, indeed, my dear," John confesses, heartily, "richly. I am glad
to see that at last you begin to take a sensible view of the subject.
If I deserved a flogging because I once shirked my tasks, what does not
Lovat deserve for a long course of such conduct?"

"He is not accused of stealing apples, at all events; and, besides,
Lovat is quite different," says Letitia, vaguely. Whereupon John tells
her her heart is running away with her head, and that her partiality is
so apparent that he must cease from further argument, and goes on with
his reading.

Presently, however, he rises, and, crossing the room, stands over her,
watching her white shapely fingers as they deftly fill up the holes in
the little socks that lie in the basket beside her. She is so far _en
rapport_ with him as to know that his manner betokens a desire for
confidence.

"Have yo