a bigger heart, a bigger hand, or half so big a foot as Bob Holliday.

The village school-house was a long one built of red brick. It had taken the place of the old log institution in which one generation of Greenbank children had learned reading, writing, and Webster’s spelling-book. There were long, continuous writing-tables down the sides of the room, with backless benches, so arranged that when the pupil was writing his face was turned toward the wall—there was a door at each end, and a box stove stood in the middle of the room, surrounded by a rectangle of four backless benches. These benches were for the little fellows who did not write, and for others when the cold should drive them nearer the stove.

The very worshipful master sat at the east end of the room, at one side of the door; there was a blackboard—a “newfangled notion” in 1850—at the other side of the door. Some of the older scholars, who could afford private desks with lids to them, suitable for concealing smuggled apples and maple-sugar, had places at the other end of the room from the master. This arrangement was convenient for quiet study, for talking on the fingers by signs, for munching apples or gingerbread, and for passing little notes between the boys and girls.

When the school had settled a little, the master struck a sharp blow on his desk for silence, and looked fiercely around the room, eager to find a culprit on whom to wreak his ill-humor. Mr. Ball was one of those old-fashioned teachers who gave the impression that he would rather beat a boy than not, and would even like to eat one, if he could find a good excuse. His eye lit upon the new scholar.

“Come here,” he said, severely, and then he took his seat.

The new boy walked timidly up to a place in front of the master’s desk. He was not handsome, his face was thin, his eyebrows were prominent, his mouth was rather large and good-humored, and there was that shy twinkle about the corners of his eyes which always marks a fun-loving spirit. But his was a serious, fine-grained face, with marks of suffering in it, and he had the air of having been once a strong fellow; of late, evidently, shaken to pieces by the ague.

“Where do you live?” demanded Mr. Ball.

“On Ferry Street.”

“What do they call you?” This was said with a contemptuous, rasping inflection that irritated the new scholar. His eyes twinkled, partly with annoyance and partly with mischief.

“They call me Jack, for the most part,”—then catching the titter that came from the girls’ side of the room, and frightened by the rising hurricane on the master’s face, he added quickly: “My name is John Dudley, sir.”

“Don’t you try to show your smartness on me, young man. You are a new-comer, and I let you off this time. Answer me that way again, and you will remember it as long as you live.” And the master glared at him like a savage bull about to toss somebody over a fence.

The new boy turned pale, and dropped his head.

“How old are you?” “Thirteen.”

“Have you ever been to school?”

“Three months.”

“Three months. Do you know how to read?”

“Yes, sir,” with a smile.

“Can you cipher?” “Yes, sir.”

“In multiplication?” “Yes, sir.”

“Long division?”

“Yes, sir; I’ve been half through fractions.”

“You said you’d been to school but three months!” “My father taught me.”

There was just a touch of pride in his voice as he said this—a sense of something superior about his father. This bit of pride angered the master, who liked to be thought to have a monopoly of all the knowledge in the town.

“Where have you been living?”

“In the Indian Reserve, of late; I was born in Cincinnati.”

“I didn’t ask you where you were born. When I ask you a question, answer that and no more.”

“Yes, sir.” There was a touch of something in the tone of this reply that amused the school, and that made the master look up quickly and suspiciously at Jack Dudley, but the expression on Jack’s face was as innocent as that of a cat who has just lapped the cream off the milk.

Pewee Rose, whose proper name was Peter Rose, had also the nickname of King Pewee. He was about fourteen years old, square built and active, of great strength for his size, and very proud of the fact that no boy in town cared to attack him. He was not bad-tempered, but he loved to be master, and there were a set of flatterers who followed him, like jackals about a lion.

As often happens, Nature had built for King Pewee a very fine body, but had forgotten to give him any mind to speak of. In any kind of chaff or banter, at any sort of talk or play where a good head was worth more than a strong arm and a broad back, King Pewee was sure to have the worst of it. A very convenient partnership had therefore grown up between him and Will Riley. Riley had muscle enough, but Nature had made him mean-spirited. He had—not exactly wit—but a facility for using his tongue, which he found some difficulty in displaying, through fear of other boys’ fists. By forming a friendship with Pewee Rose, the two managed to keep in fear the greater part of the school. Will’s rough tongue, together with Pewee’s rude fists, were enough to bully almost any boy. They let Harvey Collins alone, because he was older, and, keeping to himself, awed them by his dignity; good-natured Bob Holliday, also, was big enough to take care of himself. But the rest were all as much afraid of Pewee as they were of the master, and as Riley managed Pewee, it behooved them to be afraid of the prime minister, Riley, as well as of King Pewee.

From the first day that Jack Dudley entered the school, dressed in brown jeans, Will Riley marked him for a victim. The air of refinement about his face showed him to be a suitable person for teasing.

Riley called him “milksop,” and “sap-head”; words which seemed to the dull intellect of King Pewee exceedingly witty. And as Pewee was Riley’s defender, he felt as proud of these rude nicknames as he would had he invented them and taken out a patent.

But Riley’s greatest stroke of wit came one morning when he caught Jack Dudley milking the cow. In the village of Greenbank, milking a cow was regarded as a woman’s work; and foolish men and boys are like savages,—very much ashamed to be found doing a woman’s work. Fools always think something else more disgraceful than idleness. So, having seen Jack milking, Riley came to school happy. He had an arrow to shoot that would give great delight to the small boys.

“Good-morning, milkmaid!” he said to Jack Dudley, as he entered the school-house before school. “You milk the cow at your house, do you? Where’s your apron?”

“Oh-h! Milkmaid! milkmaid! That’s a good one,” chimed in Pewee Rose and all his set.

Jack changed color.

“Well, what if I do milk my mother’s cow? I don’t milk anybody’s cow but ours, do I? Do you think I’m ashamed of it? I’d be ashamed not to. I can”—but he stopped a minute and blushed—“I can wash dishes, and make good pancakes, too. Now if you want to make fun, why, make fun. I don’t care.” But he did care, else why should his voice choke in that way?

“Oh, girl-boy; a pretty girl-boy you