"Shut up with your * * row, you * * young * * ... No, master, I ain't molestin' of the boy; only just frightening him for a bit of a spree! _I_ don't look like the sort to hurt boys, do I, guv'nor?" This was addressed to a bystander, named in Dave's report as "the gentleman." Who was accompanied by another, described as "the lady." The latter may have said to the former:--"I think he looks a very kind-hearted man, my dear, and you are making a fuss about nothing." The latter certainly said "Hggrromph!" or something like it, which the reporter found difficult to render. Then the man assumed a hypocritical and plausible manner, saying to Michael:--"I'm your friend, my boy, and there's a new shilling for you, good for two * * tanners any day of the week." Micky seemed to have been softened by this, and entered into a colloquy with the donor, either not heard or not understood by Dave, whose narrative seemed to point to his having been sent to a distance, with a doubt about inapplicable epithets bestowed on him by the Man, calling for asterisks in a close report. Some of these were probably only half-understood, even by Micky; being, so to speak, the chirps of a gaol-bird. But Dave's report seemed to point to "Now, is that * * young * * to be trusted not to split?" although he made little attempt to render the asterisky parts of speech. Uncle Mo and Mr. Jerry glanced at one another, seeming to understand a phrase that had puzzled Aunt M'riar. "That was it, Mo," said Mr. Jerry, exactly as if Uncle Mo had spoken, "_spit upon_ meant _split upon_." Dave in his innocence had supposed that a profligacy he was himself sometimes guilty of had been referred to. He felt that his uncle's knee was for the moment the stool of repentance, but was relieved when a new reading was suggested. There could be no disgrace in splitting, though it might be painful. "And, of course," said Uncle Mo, ruffling Dave's locks, "of course, you kept your mouth tight shut--hay?" Dave, bewildered, assented. He connected this _bouche cousue_ with his own decorous abstention, not without credit to himself. Who shall trace the inner workings of a small boy's brain? "Instead of telling of it all, straight off, to your poor old uncle!" There was no serious indignation in Uncle Mo's tone, but the boy was too new for nice distinctions. The suggestion of disloyalty wounded him deeply, and he rushed into explanation. "Becorze--becorze--becorze--becorze," said he--"becorze Micky said _not_ to!" He arrived at his climax like a squib that attains its ideal.