"That boy," exclaimed Miss Bird, in a loud, nutmeg-grating tone, "ought to be sent to a reformatory." Mrs Maybury turned on her lady boarder with asperity. "You will oblige me, Miss Bird, by moderating your language when speaking of Frank." "Idle, graceless young rascal!" added Miss Bird, who was not at all afraid of Mrs Maybury. "Of course," said Mrs Maybury, with a contemptuous glance at her husband, "if the boy’s father allows him to be spoken of in this way, I, who am only his stepmother----" "Miss Bird is a little severe in her strictures, but I am afraid something must shortly be done to curb Frank’s insubordination," said Mr Maybury with admirable tact. "Try him with a whipping and dry bread and water for a week," snarled Miss Bird, who disliked children generally, and abominated Master Maybury. "Pardon?" inquired Mr Cleave, who had sat through all the clamour deep in a bilious-looking periodical called _The Total Abstainer_. Mr Cleave, it should be added, was a little deaf. As, on looking up, he found Miss Bird scowling at him, he concluded that she had addressed him. "--Bread and water for a week!" shouted Miss Bird, irritably. She hated having to repeat anything, and the case was made worse in Mr Cleave’s case by the defect in his hearing. "Water?" Mr Cleave nodded and smiled. "Certainly--plenty of water. Are you an abstainer, sir?" he concluded, turning to Jim, whose name he had not properly caught when they were introduced. "Not I," replied Jim heartily. Mr Cleave blinked severely. "You sometimes fall into deadly sin by polluting your lips with alcoholic liquor?" he inquired. "I occasionally have a drink," acknowledged Jim. Gradually a very pained and shocked expression stole over Mr Cleave’s cadaverous countenance. For Mr Cleave, as need hardly be explained, was a fanatic on the liquor question--the kind of ill-balanced enthusiast that does his cause more harm than good by his unbridled and immoderate denunciations of the evil he wishes to abolish. He gazed upon Jim with wonder and shame, and then, deeming him too hardened to be affected by remonstrance, turned for comfort to the pages of _The Total Abstainer_, and particularly to that part where notorious cases of drunkenness were set down under the kind, Christian-like heading of "OUR PILLORY."