8 DAYS STOLEN FOR SPORT 



the severest scrubbing. So swarthy was the natural 

 skin beneath its borrowed coat that even in his sweetest 

 moments, when freed from soot, there was no relief 

 to his long length of blackness, until you saw, high 

 up, his huge red hps and glittering teeth which loudly 

 called attention to the, outwardly, ugliest man I 

 have ever seen. How ugly he was may be gathered 

 from the fact that I once mistook him for the 

 devil. 



I was playing truant from school with Stanbury, 

 and we were bird's-nesting. I, being the younger, 

 had to carry the spoils which were gathered in a linii 

 mud-hned nest. This did not prevent my bending 

 down so as to get a look skywards through the bushes, 

 the more readily to detect a nest. Vv'hile I was so 

 em.ployed a terrible eye looked down on me from 

 a black and terrible face, and, close to it, the half- 

 closed tenantless socket of another eye. Before this 

 apparition my legs gave way, and I was on my knees 

 and, v/ith outstretched hands, prepared to say, 'Oh, 

 please, Mr Satan, I won't do it any more'; but my 

 mouth was so wide open that I could not move it, 

 and I was fast turning into stone when the big, red- 

 lipped m.outh opened, and the devil said, 'Why, little 

 Pliillie, doan't be fnghtened; it's only Pavey.' I 

 don't know how I got there, but I found myself nesthng 

 close to Pavey, who was patting me on the head, 

 while my chest v/as almiost bursting by the violent 

 efforts of my lungs to get back their equilibrium. 



I made my hrst acquaintance with Pavey while 

 hanging to Zvlary's skirt. Mother's spring-clean was 

 in progress and all the furniture was covered up, 

 for the chimmcy-sweep was coming. 'The girtest 

 and blackest man in all the world, but he wouldn't 

 hurt 'ee, cheel,' was Mary's opinion of the expected 

 man. So, peeping out from behind a fold of Mary's 

 gown, I was introduced. 'This be Phillie, Pavey. 

 He wants to zee 'ee go up the chimbley.' 



