ore than an hour from the _White Horse Cellar_, Piccadilly. On the top
of the posts, at each side of the gates, were two eagles; fine large
birds I thought them. They looked out on a green, fringed with tall
elms, beyond which was our cricket-field. A very magnificent red-brick
old house rose behind the eagles, full of windows belonging to our
sleeping-rooms. The playground was at the back of the house, with a
grand old tulip tree in the centre, a tectum for rainy weather on one
side, and the large school room on the other. Beyond was a good-sized
garden, full of apple and pear trees, but, as we very seldom went into
it, I do not remember its appearance. Perhaps, were I to see the place
again, I might find its dimensions somewhat altered. The master was a
first-rate schoolmaster. What his attainments were, I cannot say; but
he understood managing boys admirably. He kept us all in very good
order, had us fairly taught, fed us with wholesome, if not luxurious,
food, and, though he used his cane freely, treated us justly. We held
him in awe, and yet we liked him.

It was after the summer holidays, when I had just got back, I heard that
three new boys had come. In the afternoon they all appeared in the
playground. They were strangers to each other as well as to us, but
their similarity of fate drew them together. One was a slightly made,
dark, and somewhat delicate-looking boy; another was a sturdy little
fellow, with a round, ruddy countenance, and a jovial, good-natured
expression in it, yet he did not look as if he would stand any nonsense;
the third was rather smaller than the other two, a pleasant-looking
fellow, and though his eyes were red with crying, he seemed to be
cutting some joke which made his companions laugh. He had come all the
way from Ireland, we heard, and his elder brother had that morning left
him and gone back home, and that made him unhappy just then. He at once
got the name of Paddy in the school. He did not mind it. His real name
was Terence Adair, so sometimes he was called Paddy Adair.

"I say, you fellow, what's your name?" asked a biggish boy of the
stoutest of the three new-comers.

"Jack Rogers," was the answer, given in a quiet tone.

"I don't believe it," replied the big boy, who was known as Bully
Pigeon; "it's such a rum name."

"I'll make you believe it, and remember it too," exclaimed the
new-comer, eyeing the other from head to foot, and walking firmly up to
him,