And, in addition, as they say in political circles, when the leadership of the party is in question, "there was no vacancy." The junior partner still lived. How Percy Somerville undoubtedly had his troubles, owing chiefly to Celie Tennant's hardness of heart; but they were as nothing to the difficulties which afflicted Samson Langpenny. For instance, it was in this wise that Mr. Percy Somerville was greeted, as he appeared with a reluctant scholar who had been detected in trying to escape by the side door after the roll had been marked. (It was drawing near the time of the summer treat into the country, so it behoved the teachers to be careful in marking attendances.) "Go it, Pierce-eye! Hit him one in the eye!" This exclamation was traced afterwards to Cleg Kelly's acquaintance in day-school with a baleful ballad included in the _Royal Poetry Book_, and intituled "Chevy Chase." Mr. Somerville thereupon promptly lost his rightful and given name, and became to all eternity—or so long, at least, as he remained at Hunker Court—"Old One-in-the Eye." But it so happened that, on this particular Sunday, Cleg's teacher with the pugnacious title was absent; and, in despite of the notice prominently placarded on the walls behind the superintendent's desk, he was absent without having provided a substitute. There was nothing for it, therefore, but that Samson Langpenny should take the class himself. And he would as soon have faced a battery of artillery as a class in which sat the Egyptian plague of his school, Cleg Kelly. It was, indeed, on this particular day that there came to Samson the resolution to try him with Miss Celie Tennant as a last resource, previous to a second and final expulsion. Indeed, he would have chosen the latter alternative long ago, but for a well-grounded inward belief that, at the close of the hour after Cleg's compulsory exit, there would not be a whole pane of glass in all the many windows of Hunker Court Sunday school. He remembered well as a teacher the awful scene which accompanied the first expulsion under the reign of "Pund o' Cannles"—a scene which since his return had made Cleg almost idolised by the scholars of Hunker Court. Samson Langpenny sat down to teach the Border Ruffians of the Sooth Back—Cleg Kelly's class. Now he was out of place, and knew it. His true sphere in a Sunday school was in the infant department; where, with a packet of butterscotch and "Hush-a-bye, Baby!" he might have been a great and shining success. Why the minister did not see this was a standing problem in Hunker Court. But, as the teachers said one to another on their several ways home: "It is so hard to get the minister to see anything—_and as for his wife_——" "Can you say your Psalm—metrical version?" asked Samson Langpenny, as though of a certainty they were all letter-perfect in the prose version. "_I_ can," said Cleg Kelly promptly. "Then," said Samson, smiling, well-pleased, "we will take you last."