He did so, with a heavy heart, wondering how he was ever to be like the
other boys, if nobody would take him in hand, and teach him to play, or
even let him learn. Remembering what his mother expected of him, he
tried to sing, to prevent crying, and began to count the pales round the
playground, for something to do. This presently brought him to a tree
which stood on the very boundary, its trunk serving instead of two or
three pales. It was only a twisted old apple-tree; but the more twisted
and gnarled it was, the more it looked like a tree that Hugh could
climb; and he had always longed to climb a tree. Glancing up, he saw a
boy already there, sitting on the fork of two branches, reading.

"Have you a mind to come up?" asked the boy.

"Yes, sir, I should like to try and climb a tree. I never did."

"Well, this is a good one to begin with. I'll lend you a hand; shall
I?"

"Thank you, sir."

"Don't call me, `sir.' I'm only a schoolboy, like you. I am Dan Firth.
Call me Firth, as I am the only one of the name here. You are little
Proctor, I think--Proctor's brother."

"Yes: but, Firth, I shall pull you down, if I slip."

"Not you: but I'll come down, and so send you up to my seat, which is
the safest to begin with. Stand off."

Firth swung himself down, and then, showing Hugh where to plant his
feet, and propping him when he wanted it, he soon seated him on the
fork, and laughed good-naturedly when Hugh waved his cap over his head,
on occasion of being up in a tree. He let him get down and up again
several times, till he could do it quite alone, and felt that he might
have a seat here whenever it was not occupied by any one else.

While Hugh sat in the branches, venturing to leave hold with one hand,
that he might fan his hot face with his cap, Firth stood on the rail of
the palings, holding by the tree, and talking to him. Firth told him
that this was the only tree the boys were allowed to climb, since Ned
Reeve had fallen from the great ash, and hurt his spine. He showed what
trees he had himself climbed before that accident; and it made Hugh
giddy to think of being within eight feet of the top of the lofty elm in
the churchyard, which Firth had thought nothing of mounting.

"Did anybody teach you?" asked Hugh.

"Yes; my father taught me to climb, when I was younger than you."

"And had you anybody to teach you games and things, when you came here?"

"No: but I had learned a good deal of t