an ill-spelt word; and there's another; and you have not at all attended
to the punctuation; but the general sense of the piece is good,--very
good indeed, Sir." And then he added, with a grim smile, "_Care_, Sir,
is, I daresay, as you remark, a very bad thing; but you may safely
bestow a little more of it on your spelling and your grammar."

The school, like almost all the other grammar-schools of the period in
Scotland, had its yearly cock-fight, preceded by two holidays and a
half, during which the boys occupied themselves in collecting and
bringing up their cocks. And such always was the array of fighting birds
mustered on the occasion, that the day of the festival, from morning
till night, used to be spent in fighting out the battle. For weeks after
it had passed, the school-floor would continue to retain its
deeply-stained blotches of blood, and the boys would be full of exciting
narratives regarding the glories of gallant birds, who had continued to
fight until both their eyes had been picked out, or who, in the moment
of victory, had dropped dead in the middle of the cock-pit. The yearly
fight was the relic of a barbarous age; and, in at least one of its
provisions, there seemed evidence that it was that of an intolerant age
also: every pupil at school, without exemption, had his name entered on
the subscription-list, as a cock-fighter, and was obliged to pay the
master at the rate of twopence per head, ostensibly for leave to bring
his birds to the pit; but, amid the growing humanities of a better
time, though the twopences continued to be exacted, it was no longer
imperative to bring the birds; and availing myself of the liberty I
never brought any. Nor, save for a few minutes, on two several
occasions, did I ever attend the fight. Had the combat been one among
the boys themselves, I would readily enough have done my part, by
meeting with any opponent of my years and standing; but I could not bear
to look at the bleeding birds. And so I continued to pay my yearly
sixpence, as a holder of three cocks,--the lowest sum deemed in any
degree genteel,--but remained simply a fictitious or paper cock-fighter,
and contributed in no degree to the success of the _head-stock_ or
leader, to whose party, in the general division of the school, it was my
lot to fall. Neither, I must add, did I learn to take an interest in the
sacrificial orgies of the adjoining slaughter-house. A few of the chosen
school-boys were permitted b