,
cheerful, and refreshed, with thoughts:

"Pleasant as roses in the thickets blown,
And pure as dew bathing their crimson leaves;"

to get over his lessons easily and successfully, and receive Mr Paton's
quiet word of praise; to shake with laughing over the flood of nonsense
with which Henderson always deluged everyone who sat near him at
breakfast-time; to help little Eden in his morning's work, and to see
with what intense affection and almost adoration the child looked up to
him; to stroll with Kenrick under the pine woods, or have a pleasant
chat in Power's pretty little study, or read a book in the luxurious
retirement of Mr Percival's room, or, if it were a half-holiday, to
join in the skating, hare and hounds, football, or whatever game might
be on hand--all these things were to Walter Evson one long unbroken
pleasure. At this time he was the brightest, and pleasantest, and
happiest of all light-hearted and happy English boys.

The permission to go whenever he liked to Mr Percival's room was his
most valued privilege. There he could always secure such immunity from
disturbance as enabled him to learn his lessons in half the time he
would otherwise have been obliged to devote to them; and there too he
could always ask the master's assistance when he came to any insuperable
difficulty, and always enjoy the society of Henderson and the one or two
other boys who were allowed by Mr Percival's kindness to use the same
retreat. From the bottom of his form he rapidly rose to the top, and at
last was actually placed first. A murmur of pleasure ran through the
form on the first Sunday when his name was read out in this honourable
position, and it gave Walter nearly as much satisfaction to hear
Henderson's name read out _sixth_ on the same day; for before Walter
came, Henderson was too volatile ever to care where he stood in form,
and usually spent his time in school in drawing caricatures of the
masters, and writing parodies of the lesson or epigrams on other boys;
up till this time Daubeny had always been first in the form, and he
deserved the place if any boy did. He was not a clever boy, but nothing
could exceed his well-intentioned industry. Like Sir Walter Raleigh he
"toiled terribly." It was an almost pathetic sight to see Dubbs set
about learning his repetitions; it was a noble sight, too. There was a
heroism about it which was all the greater from its being unnoticed and
unrecorded. Poor Dubbs had