“Faugh!” exclaimed Mr. Roylston. “Spare me your coarse irreverence. You are redolent of the unpleasant odors of the Pie-house. I will give you five marks apiece.” “Oh, sir!” “Please, sir!” “I beg of you, sir. Pray divide ‘em, sir.” “Silence, Wilson; you are impertinent as well as irreverent. If you linger longer with this futile protesting, I shall double your marks. Kindly go at once and unpack your trunks.” “Please, sir; we always do that in the evening, sir; and I hope you will allow us to go to the form-room, sir.” “Don’t ‘sir’ me so. Write out for me before to-morrow’s school fifty lines of the Æneid, and go at once.” “Very good, sir!” And lest they all get a similar dose of “pensum,” as such punishments were called, they hurried off to the Third Form common-room. There they found a crowd of newly-arrived boys, engaged in a vociferous denunciation of the Doctor’s new rule against caves in the Woods. The news had evidently been announced by the prefects. “What a gloomy old piece of rubber the Gumshoe is!” muttered Kit, as they were entering. “Fancy soaking me a pensum two minutes after I’m back at school. Hey, you fellows!” he cried, “what’s this racket?” A dozen boys started to explain together, so that from their noisy chatter nothing could be gathered, except “Woods,” “caves” and execrations on the Head and the Sixth, with Kit’s lament on the gloomy Mr. Roylston rising above it all like a dismal howl. A Fourth Form boy,—Barney Clayton, by name,—thrust a red head through the open doorway. “Oh, fy!” he yelled, “what a precious howl you kids are letting out! What’s the matter? does the prohibition against caves rile your independent spirits?” “Get out, you red-head!” rose in angry chorus; and one boy shied a dog-eared Latin book at the fiery shock in the doorway. In a second a shower of missiles,—ink-stands, books, chairs, waste-paper basket,—went flying through the doorway and out into the corridor. Barney ducked his head and fled, shouting back derisive taunts. The commotion attracted the attention of Mr. Roylston at his post in the main hall, and he came flying to quell the disturbance. And, alas! he arrived just at a moment to receive full in the face the contents of a waste-paper basket, which Kit had flung. The débris descended upon him in comical fashion. The poor gentleman was speechless with indignation; but the situation was too much for the boys; despite his angry countenance, his blazing black eyes, they greeted his appearance with shouts of laughter. He waited, inarticulate with rage, until the commotion ceased, finally quelling them to a spell-bound silence by the sheer force of his anger, and a little also, by the righteousness of his cause.