He ran up to the playground as hard as he could tear to work off the excitement of his spirits, and get rid of the inward turmoil. On a grass bank at the far end of it he saw two boys seated, whom he knew at once to be Henderson and Kenrick, who, for a wonder, were reading, not green novels, but Shakespeare! "I'll tell you what it is, Henderson," he said; "I _can't_ and I _won't_ stand this any longer. It's the last detention breaks the boy's back. I hate Saint Winifred's, I hate Dr Lane, I hate Robertson, and I _hate, hate, hate_ Paton!" he said, stamping angrily. "Hooroop!" said Henderson; "so the patient Evson is on fire at last. Tell it not to Dubbs." "Why, Walter, what's all this about?" asked Kenrick. "Why, Ken," said Walter, more quietly, "here's a history of my life: Greek grammar, lines, detention, caning--caning, detention, lines, Greek grammar. I'm sick of it; I _can't_ and I _won't_ stand it any more." "Whether," spouted Henderson, from the volume on his knee-- "`Whether 'twere nobler for the mind to suffer The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, Or to take arms against a sea of troubles. And by opposing end them!'" "End them I will," said Walter; "somehow, I'll pay him out, depend upon it." "Recte si possis si non quocunque modo," said Somers, the head of the school, whose fag Walter was, and who, passing by at the moment, caught the last sentence; "what is the excitement among you small boys?" "The old story--pitching into Paton," said Kenrick indifferently, and rather contemptuously; for he was a _protege_ of Somers, and felt annoyed that he should see Walter's unreasonable display, the more so as Somers had asked him already, "why he was so much with that idle new fellow who was always being placed lag in his form?" "What's it all about?" asked Somers of Kenrick. "Because he gets lines for missing his grammar, I suppose." There was something in the tone which was especially offensive to Walter; for it sounded as if Kenrick wanted to show him the cold shoulder before his _great_ friend, the head of the school. "Oh, _that_ all? Well, my dear fellow, the remedy's easy; work at it a little harder;" and Somers walked on, humming a tune. "I wonder what he calls _harder_," said Walter, shaking his fist; "when I first came I used to get up quite early in the morning, and learn it till I was half-stupid; I wonder whether he ever did as much?" "Well, but it's no good abusing Paton," said Kenrick; "of course, if you don't know the lesson, he concludes you haven't learnt it." "Thank you for nothing, Kenrick," said Walter curtly; "come along, Flip." Kenrick was vexed; he was conscious of having shown a little coolness and want of sympathy; and he looked anxiously after Henderson and Walter as they walked away.