"O God, I am all alone here, where nobody knows me; and everything is very strange and uncomfortable. Please, make people kind to me till I am used to them; and keep up a brave heart in me, if they are not. Help me not to mind little things; but to do my lessons well, that I may get to like being a Crofton boy, as I thought I should. I love them all at home very much,--better than I ever did before. Make them love me, and think of me every day,--particularly Agnes,--that they may be as glad as I shall be when I go home at Christmas." This was the most of what he had to say; and he dropped asleep with the feeling that God was listening to him. After a long while, as it seemed to him, though it was only an hour, there was a light and some bustle in the room. It was Phil and two others coming to bed. "O Phil!" cried Hugh, starting bolt upright and winking with sleep,--"I meant to keep awake, to ask you to be sure and call me in the morning, time enough,--quite time enough, please." The others laughed; and Phil asked whether he had not seen the bell, as he came; and what it should be for but to ring everybody up in the morning. "But I might not hear it," pleaded Hugh. "Not hear it? You'll soon see that." "Well, but you will see that I really do wake, won't you?" "The bell will take care of that, I tell you," was all he could get from Phil. CHAPTER FIVE. CROFTON PLAY. Hugh found, in the morning, that there was no danger of his not hearing the bell. Its clang clang startled him out of a sound sleep; and he was on his feet on the floor almost before his eyes were open. The boys who were more used to the bell did not make quite so much haste. They yawned a few times, and turned out more slowly; so that Hugh had the great tin wash basin to himself longer than the rest. There was a basin to every three boys; and, early as Hugh began, his companions were impatient long before he had done. At first, they waited, in curiosity to see what he was going to do after washing his face; when he went further, they began to quiz; but when they found that he actually thought of washing his feet, they hooted and groaned at him for a dirty brat. "Dirty!" cried Hugh, facing them, amazed, "Dirty for washing my feet! Mother says it is a dirty trick not to wash all over every day." Phil told him that was stuff and nonsense here. There was no room and no time for such home-doings. The boys all washed their heads and feet on Saturdays. He would soon find that he might be glad to get his face and hands done in the mornings. The other boys in the room were, or pretended to be, so disgusted with the very idea of washing feet in a basin, that they made Hugh rinse and rub out the tin basin several times before they would use it, and then there was a great bustle to get down-stairs at the second bell. Hugh pulled his brother's arm, as Phil was brushing out of the room, and asked, in a whisper, whether there would be time to say his prayers.