Page:The Fight at Dame Europa's School.djvu/23

 constant attacks from the town cads, who used to overrun it in the night and pull up the newly planted flowers. The cats, too, were fond of prowling about in it, and making havoc among the beds. Nobody bid for it, therefore, and it seemed to be going begging.

"Don't you think," said Mark one day to his friend and patron, "that your little cousin, the new Boy, might as well have that garden?"

"I don't see why he should not, if he wants it," replied William, by no means deep enough to understand what his faithful fag was driving at.

"It will be so nice for Louis, don't you see, to have William to keep him in check on one side, and William's little cousin to watch him on the other side," observed Mark, innocently.

"Ah, to be sure," exclaimed William, beginning to wake up, "so it will; very nice indeed. Mark, you are a sly dog."

"I should say, if you paid Louis the compliment to propose it, that it is such a delicate little attention as he would never forget—even if you withdrew the proposal afterwards."

"Just so, my Boy, and then we shall have to fight. But look here, won't the other chaps say that I provoked the quarrel?"