s a book for you, that
my sister--that is, I--Johnson's Dixonary, you know; ... you mustn't
leave us without that! Good-bye! Drive on, coachman!--God bless you!"

And the kind creature retreated into the garden, overcome with emotion.

But, lo! and just as the coach drove off, Miss Sharp suddenly put her
pale face out of the window, and flung the book back into the
garden--flung it far and fast--watching it fall at the feet of astonished
Miss Jemima; then sank back in the carriage, exclaiming: "So much for the
'Dixonary'; and, thank God, I am out of Chiswick!"

The shock of such an act almost caused Jemima to faint with terror.

"Well, I never--" she began. "What an audacious--" she gasped.
Emotion prevented her from completing either sentence.

The carriage rolled away; the great gates were closed; the bell rang for
the dancing lesson. The world is before the two young ladies; and so,
farewell to Chiswick Mall.

CUFFS FIGHT WITH "FIGS"

[Illustration: CUFF'S FIGHT WITH "FIGS."]

Cuff's fight with Figs, and the unexpected issue of that contest, will
long be remembered by every man who was educated at Dr. Swishtail's
famous school. The latter youth (who used to be called Heigh-ho Dobbin,
Gee-ho Dobbin, Figs, and by many other names indicative of puerile
contempt) was the quietest, the clumsiest, and, as it seemed, the dullest
of all Dr. Swishtail's young gentlemen. His parent was a grocer in the
city: and it was bruited abroad that he was admitted into Dr. Swishtails
academy upon what are called "mutual principles"--that is to say, the
expenses of his board and schooling were defrayed by his father in goods,
not money; and he stood there--almost at the bottom of the school--in his
scraggy corduroys and jacket, through the seams of which his great big
bones were bursting, as the representative of so many pounds of tea,
candles, sugar, mottled-soap, plums (of which a very mild proportion was
supplied for the puddings of the establishment), and other commodities. A
dreadful day it was for young Dobbin when one of the youngsters of the
school, having run into the town upon a poaching excursion for hardbake
and polonies, espied the cart of Dobbin & Rudge, Grocers and Oilmen,
Thames Street, London, at the Doctor's door, discharging a cargo of the
wares in which the firm dealt.

Young Dobbin had no peace after that. The jokes were frightful and
merciless against him.

"Hullo, Dobbin," one wag would say, "here