“I like the tone of your vindication much. It shows the proper spirit which I wish to cultivate, and a correct sense of what your duties are as a member of society. Be assured that I hate as much as you do the character of a talebearer and meddler, and a fellow who takes advantage of a little brief authority to gratify his own spite and love of importance. And in my reply to Dr. Arnold I said, that having been bred up on the system of ‘study to be quiet and mind your own business,’ you might very likely have fallen into the extreme of non-interference; which I thought was the best extreme for a gentleman to follow. I also hinted that his pets might not be quite immaculate in their motives, or deserve the good opinion of the more gentlemanly boys of their own standing, who had a right to form their own judgment and limit their own acquaintance, though not to interfere with the discipline of the school. What you have said of the fellow who caused the expulsion (rustication I should call it) of the others, confirms me. His conduct, in fact, if his words could be proved, deserves a round robin to Arnold from the school; and if you are sure it is so, I will back you with my full sanction in cutting any such malicious rascal. I think you will see after this that I do not speak from the notions of a pedant or a disciplinarian, and that I do not care two straws how you stand in the opinion of Doctor this, or Doctor that, provided you deserve your own good opinion as a Christian and a gentleman, and do justice to good principles and good blood, for which things you are indebted to sources independent of Rugby. But with all this I do not abandon my position, of which indeed you seem convinced, that order must be enforced at the expense of disagreeable duties. All I wish is this: put Dr. A. out of the question if you please, and enter into the views of the parents of the junior boys as if they were your own family friends: with this view you will not only protect their sons in their little comforts and privileges, but steadily check those habits in them which might render them nuisances in general society, or involve them in scrapes at school. After all, Arnold was right as to the prevention of crackers in the quadrangle, and you ought to have stopped it; on this point you say nothing. As to the investigation of the image matter: if you were not there at the time, you may not be blameable for want of success, and if they expected you to pump Tom, or employ any underhand means in getting at the truth, they knew but little of your family habits. Albeit, I wish the thing could have been traced. It was mean and cowardly, and, if it happened often, ruinous to the character of the school, inasmuch as the fellows did not