“But what shall I say,” he continued, “to this last business? Here everything reaches a climax. Not satisfied with having thrown the whole school into a panic, and with making the garret seem a haunted place to most of the boys,--a place, in fact, into which none dared to go but yourselves,--not satisfied with all this, you determined upon an act which is sufficient to demand serious punishment. Having already raised an almost intolerable terror in the school, you deliberately proceed to intensify even this, and raise that terror into a perfect anguish. Was not the panic sufficient already? Did you wish it to terminate in some tragedy? Would it have been satisfactory to you if the feeble brain of some of the younger boys had given way under this new terror? if some one of them had suddenly gone mad, as that abhorrent roar, that mixture of howls, and yells, and screeches, and hoots, rising up into an unearthly din, and intermingled with the awful toll of the bell, had burst upon his ear? Such things have happened. There have been, not boys, but men, who have gone mad from things even less terrible than these. Why, when I think of what might have happened, I shudder, and I stand amazed at what I charitably consider your thoughtlessness; though for such thoughtlessness as this, what punishment can be adequate? “And now,” he concluded, “what have you to say for yourselves?” All this time the faces of the boys were like fire, and writhing in indignation, they looked back at Mr. Long as he hurled against them what they felt to be unmerited accusations. They had only been concerned in the last affair for the purpose of putting an effectual end to the other. But as they sat there in the consciousness of innocence, they saw that it was impossible for them to explain it. They could not tell what they knew, for that would be to accuse Pat. “Mr. Long,” burst forth Bart, starting up, with his face in a flame, and his voice trembling with indignation, “every word that you have uttered is utterly and totally undeserved by us. I assure you most solemnly that we have never violated any principles of honor or of chivalry. You do not know the facts, sir, or you would never have uttered those bitter words. You have done us great wrong, sir; we are not deserving of such charges as these. We are innocent; but we are not in a position to explain.” Bart paused for a moment, and in that momentary pause another voice burst in as eagerly and as impetuously as his own. It was Pat. He had started to his feet just as Bart did, but Bart had spoken before him. As soon as he could get a chance he burst in.