h master, holding up his candle. "Let me see! Ah, I understand!
You, Blackall, are one very bad boy. You go to bed now. Bracebridge,
Ellis, you come with me."

Ellis on this jumped off Blackall's back, and glad he was to do so, for
his arms were beginning to ache terribly with his exertions.

Blackall sneaked off, vowing vengeance in his craven heart on his
adversaries; and the kind-hearted Frenchman led the other two away, and
urged them to keep clear of the bully. When, however, he heard how the
affair had taken place, he was very much inclined to go and inform the
Doctor, to try and get Blackall expelled, but they entreated aim not to
do so, and declared that they did not fear him, and would not run the
risk of thus injuring his prospects.

"Ah, you are brave garcons, brave garcons!" exclaimed Monsieur Malin.

At all events, they were true, right-feeling English boys.

CHAPTER SIX.

OUR MILITARY EXERCISES.

Bracebridge had to press his advice on Ellis more than once before he
could induce him to apply for leave to drill and to learn fencing and
the broadsword exercise. All these sort of lessons were classed among
the extras, so that the Doctor did not insist on the boys learning them
unless by the express wish of their parents. If they themselves wished
to learn them, they had to write home and get leave. This system, I
fancy, made these branches of education far more popular than they would
otherwise have been. The several masters, knowing that the number of
their pupils depended on the interest they could excite in their
respective sciences, did their utmost to make them attractive. They
generally succeeded.

Monsieur Malin would, at all events, have been popular. He was a
gentleman by birth and by education, of polished manners, and very
good-natured, and as everybody liked him, everybody wished to learn
French. Old Dibble, our drill-sergeant, was very unlike him in most
respects, but still he won all our hearts. He was a kind-hearted man,
and had an excellent temper, and he took great pains to teach us our
drill and to make us like it. He was the very man to turn us all into
soldiers, and, as Bracebridge had said of him, he never grew weary of
recounting his deeds of arms to all whom he could find ready to listen.
He was a tall man, somewhat stout, with a bald patch on the top of his
head, and grey hair and whiskers, a thoroughly soldier-like hooked nose,
and fine piercing grey eyes. G