CHAP. II. ] Plays the Truant. 43 
inquiries were usually about fish—where they came from, 
what their names were, what was the difference between the 
different fishes, and so on. The fish-market was also a 
grand place for big blue flies, great beetles with red and 
yellow backs (burying beetles), and daylight rottens. They 
were the tamest rats he had ever seen, excepting two that 
he used to carry about in his pockets. His rats knew him 
as well as a dog knows his master. 
But Tom’s playing the truant and lingering about the 
fish-market soon became known to his mother; and then 
she sent for her mother, Tom’s ‘grannie, to take him to 
school. She was either to see him “in at the door,” or ac- 
company him into the school itself. But Tom did not like 
the supervision of his grannie. He rebelled against it. He 
played the truant under her very eyes. When grannie put 
him in at the door, calling out “Bell!” to the school-mis- 
tress up-stairs, Tom would wait until he thought the old 
woman was sufficiently distant, and then steal out, and run 
away, by cross streets, to the Denburn or the Inches. 
But that kind of truant-playing also got to be known; 
and then grannie had to drag him to school. When she 
seized him by the “scruff o’ the neck,” she had him quite 
tight. It was of no use attempting to lie down or sit down. 
Her hand was like a vise, and she kept him straight upon 
his feet. He tried to wriggle, twist, turn himself round as 
on a pivot, and then make a bolt. She nevertheless held 
on, and dragged him to school, into the presence of Bell 
Hill, and said, ‘‘ Here’s your truant!” Tom’s only chance 
was to go along very quietly, making no attempt to escape, 
grannie’s clutches, and then, watching for an opportunity, 
he would make a sudden dart and slip through her fingers. 
He ran, and she ran; but in rugping, Tom far outstripped 
her; for though grannie’s legs were very much longer than 
his, they were also very much stiffer. 
The boy was sent one morning to buy three rolls for 
breakfast ; but after he had bought the rolls, instead of go- 
