"You all know," he said, "that Dimock meant to cane Harpour because he played off a joke against one of the fellows last night. Harpour refused to take the caning, and the monitors are holding a meeting this morning to decide what to do about Harpour. Now _I_ maintain that they've no right to do anything; and it's very important that we shouldn't let them have just their own way. The thing was merely a joke. Who thinks anything of just putting on a mask in fun, to startle another fellow? One constantly hears of its being done merely to raise a laugh, and we must all have often seen pictures of it. Of course, in this case, every one is extremely sorry for the consequences, but it was impossible to foresee _them_, and nobody has any right to judge of the act because it has turned out so unluckily. I vote that we put the question--`Have the monitors any right to interfere?'" Loud applause greeted the end of Kenrick's speech, and the little bit at the end about separating an act from its consequences told wonderfully among the boys. They raised an almost unanimous cry of "Well done, Ken", "Quite right", "Harpour shan't be caned." Henderson had been watching Kenrick with an expression of intense anger and disdain. At the end of his remarks, he sprang, rather than rose, up and immediately began to pour out an impetuous answer. His first words, before the fellows had observed that he meant to speak, were drowned in the general uproar; and when they had all caught sight of him, an expression of decided disapprobation ran round the throng of listeners. It did not make him swerve in the slightest degree. Looking round scornfully and steadily, he said-- "I know why some of you hiss. You think I told Dimock of Harpour. As it happens I _didn't_; but I'm neither afraid nor ashamed to tell you all, as I told Harpour to his face, that I had fully intended to do it-- or rather I meant to tell, not Dimock, but Somers. _Will_ you let me speak?" he asked, angrily, as his last sentence was interrupted by a burst of groans, commenced by a few of those whose interests were most at stake, and taken up by the mass of ignorant boys. Power plucked Henderson by the sleeve, and whispered, "Hush, Flip; go on, but keep your temper." "I've as much right to speak--if this is meant for a school meeting--as Kenrick or any one else; and what I have to say is this: Kenrick has been merely throwing dust into your eyes, misleading you altogether about the true state of the case. It's all very fine, and very easy for him to talk so lightly of its being `a joke,' and `a bit of fun,' and so on; but I should like to ask him whether he believes that? and whether he's not just hunting for popularity, and mixing up with it a few private spites? and whether he's not thoroughly ashamed of himself at this moment? There! you may see that he is," continued Henderson, pointing at him; "see how he is blushing scarlet, and looking the very picture of degradation."