A Day of Punishment 



doing of which I relieved myself of a par- 

 ticle of my superabundant naughtiness. 

 A few yards on ahead of me I spied a 

 schoolfellow, a weak-eyed boy who was 

 always late, and had a mother who beat 

 him sometimes, when she was not sober. 

 I came up quietly behind him and, whisk- 

 ing his cap into the middle of the road by 

 way of greeting, suggested that we should 

 go school-wards by way of the beach 

 (which was as who should say, standing at 

 the north end of Pordand Place, '' Let us 

 go to Tottenham Court Road by way of 

 Oxford Street ") : this he agreed to with 

 enthusiasm, and we jogged along merrily 

 enough. We had a match in the throw- 

 ing of ducks and drakes, and my last ves- 

 tige of ill-humour cleared off when I 

 realised that my prowess in this art was 

 greater than Jack's. There Is nothing in 

 the world so soothing to one's temper as 

 the tickling of one's vanity : 'tis a fine 

 counter-irritant. 



We certainly took our time and eventu- 

 ally arrived at Mr. Blocker's door in the 

 best of tempers and on three legs, having 

 tied our two neighbouring limbs together 

 with my handkerchief; and as we were 

 freeing ourselves with a monstrous gig- 

 gling In the porch, Jack was so smitten 

 142 



