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 not being quite sure of his ground, took the high and pathetic tone, and was proceeding to say, "how that, having learned his lessons with them for so many years, it would grieve him much to put an end to the arrangement; and he hoped, at any rate, that, if they wouldn't go on with him, they should still be just as good friends and respect one another's motives—but—"

Here the other boys, who had been listening with open eyes and ears, burst in:

"Stuff and nonsense!" cried Gower. "Here, East, get down the crib and find the place."

"Oh, Tommy, Tommy!" said East, proceeding to do as he was bidden, "that it should ever have come to this. I knew Arthur'd be the ruin of you some day, and you of me. And now the time's come." And he made a doleful face.

"I don't know about ruin," answered Tom; "I know that you and I would have had the sack long ago if it hadn't been for him. And you know it as well as I."

"Well, we were in a baddish way before he came, I own; but this new crotchet of his is past a joke."

"Let's give it a trial, Harry; come—you know how often he has been right and we wrong."

"Now, don't you two be jawing away about young Square-toes," struck in Gower. "He's no end of a sucking wiseacre, I dare say, but we've no time to lose, and I've got the fives'-court at half-past nine."

"I say, Gower," said Tom, appealingly, "be a good fellow, and let's try if we can't get on without the crib."

"What! in this chorus? Why, we sha'n't get through ten lines."

"I say, Tom," cried East, having hit on a new idea, "don't you remember, when we were in the upper fourth, and old Momus caught me construing off the leaf of a crib which I'd torn out and put in my book, and which would float out onto the floor, he sent me up to be flogged for it it?"