ple a little coarse-fibred. Her
specialty was to look after the feathering, cackling, roosting, rising,
and general behavior of these hundred chicks. An honest, ignorant woman,
she could not have passed an examination in the youngest class. So this
distinguished institution was under the charge of a commissary and a
housekeeper, and its real business was making money by taking young girls
in as boarders.

Connected with this, however, was the incidental fact, which the public
took for the principal one, namely, the business of instruction. Mr.
Peckham knew well enough that it was just as well to have good
instructors as bad ones, so far as cost was concerned, and a great deal
better for the reputation of his feeding-establishment. He tried to get
the best he could without paying too much, and, having got them, to screw
all the work out of them that could possibly be extracted.

There was a master for the English branches, with a young lady assistant.
There was another young lady who taught French, of the ahvaung and
baundahng style, which does not exactly smack of the asphalt of the
Boulevards. There was also a German teacher of music, who sometimes
helped in French of the ahfaung and bauntaung style,--so that, between
the two, the young ladies could hardly have been mistaken for Parisians,
by a Committee of the French Academy. The German teacher also taught a
Latin class after his fashion,--benna, a ben, gahboot, ahead, and so
forth.

The master for the English branches had lately left the school for
private reasons, which need not be here mentioned,--but he had gone, at
any rate, and it was his place which had been offered to Mr. Bernard
Langdon. The offer came just in season,--as, for various causes, he was
willing to leave the place where he had begun his new experience.

It was on a fine morning that Mr. Bernard, ushered in by Mr. Peckham,
made his appearance in the great schoolroom of the Apollinean Institute.
A general rustle ran all round the seats when the handsome young man was
introduced. The principal carried him to the desk of the young lady
English assistant, Miss Darley by name, and introduced him to her.

There was not a great deal of study done that day. The young lady
assistant had to point out to the new master the whole routine in which
the classes were engaged when their late teacher left, and which had gone
on as well as it could since. Then Master Langdon had a great many
questions