That
boy's school character is perfect, except for a certain cool
opinionativeness, which seldom comes out with me, but greatly annoys
the undermasters."
"Is he a prig?"
"Well, yes, I'm afraid he is. He's unpopular, for he does not care
for games; but his brother is popular enough for both."
"Jock?-—the monkey!"
"His brains run to mischief. I've had to set him more impositions
than any boy in the school, and actually to take his form myself, for
simply the undermasters can't keep up discipline or their own
tempers. As to poor M. le Blanc, I find him dancing and shrieking
with fury in the midst of a circle of snorting, giggling boys; and
when he points out ce petit monstre, Jock coolly owns to having
translated 'Croquons les,' let us croquet them; or 'Je suis blesse,'
I am blest."
"So the infusion of brains produces too much effervescence."
"Yes, but the whole school has profited, and none more so than No. 2
of the other family, who has quite passed his elder brother, and is
above his namesake whenever it is a case of plodding ability versus
idle genius. But, after all, how little one can know of one's boys."
"Or one's girls," said Mary, thinking of governess experiences.
It was a showery summer evening when the brother and sister walked up
to the Folly in a partial clearing, when the evening sun made every
bush twinkle all over with diamond drops.
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