As for attending them in real illness, do you suppose that she would watch a single night for any one of them? Not she. When poor little Charley Davison (that child, a lock of whose soft hair I have said how Miss Raby still keeps) lay ill of scarlet fever in the holidays--for the Colonel, the father of these boys, was in India--it was Anne Raby who tended the child, who watched him all through the fever, who never left him while it lasted, or until she had closed the little eyes that were never to brighten or moisten more. Anny watched and deplored him, but it was Miss Birch who wrote the letter announcing his demise, and got the gold chain and locket which the Colonel ordered as a memento of his gratitude. It was through a row with Miss Birch that Frank Davison ran away. I promise you that after he joined his regiment in India, the Ahmednuggar Irregulars, which his gallant father commands, there came over no more annual shawls and presents to Dr. and Miss Birch, and that if she fancied the Colonel was coming home to marry her (on account of her tenderness to his motherless children, which he was always writing about), _that_ notion was very soon given up. But these affairs are of early date, seven years back, and I only heard of them in a very confused manner from Miss Raby, who was a girl, and had just come to Rodwell Regis. She is always very much moved when she speaks about those boys, which is but seldom. I take it the death of the little one still grieves her tender heart. Yes, it is Miss Birch, who has turned away seventeen ushers and second masters in eleven years, and half as many French masters; inconsolable, I suppose, since the departure of her _favourite_, M. Grinche, with her gold watch, &c.; but this is only surmise--and what I gather from the taunts of Miss Rosa when she and her aunt have a tiff at tea. But besides this, I have another way of keeping her in order. Whenever she is particularly odious or insolent to Miss Raby, I have but to introduce raspberry jam into the conversation, and the woman holds her tongue. She will understand me. I need not say more. _Note, 12th December_.--I _may_ speak now. I have left the place and don't mind. I say then at once, and without caring twopence for the consequences, that I saw this woman, this _mother_ of the boys, _eating jam with a spoon out of Master Wiggins's trunk in the box-room_; and of this I am ready to take an affidavit any day. A TRAGEDY. THIS DRAMA OUGHT TO BE REPRESENTED IN ABOUT SIX CUTS. _[The School is hushed. Lawrence the Prefect, and Custos of the rods, is marching after the Doctor into the operating-room. Master Backhouse is about to follow.]_ [Illustration: 0048] _Master Backhouse_. It's all very well, but you see if I don't pay you out after school--you sneak, you. _Master Lurcher_. If you do I '1l tell again. [Exit Backhouse. [_The rod is heard from the adjoining apartment. Hwish--Hhwish--hwish--hwish--hwish--hwish--hwish._]