nt the boys to think I am
afraid of them; or to begin giving up to them."

"You are right there. We will let it alone now, and cut it when it
suits our convenience."

"What a nice place this is, to be sure!" cried Hugh, as the feeling of
loneliness went off. "But the rooks do not make so much noise as I
expected."

"You will find what they can do in that way when spring comes,--when
they are building."

"And when may we go out upon the heath, and into the fields where the
lambs are?"

"We go long walks on Saturday afternoons; but you do not expect to see
young lambs in October, do you?"

"O, I forgot I never can remember the seasons for things."

"That shows you are a Londoner. You will learn all those things here.
If you look for hares in our walks, you may chance to see one; or you
may start a pheasant; but take care you don't mention lambs, or
goslings, or cowslips, or any spring things; or you will never hear the
last of it."

"Thank you: but what will poor Holt do? He is from India, and he knows
very little about our ways."

"They may laugh at him; but they will not despise him as they might a
Londoner. Being an Indian, and being a Londoner, are very different
things."

"And yet how proud the Londoners are over the country! It is very odd."

"People are proud of their own ways all the world over. You will be
proud of being a Crofton boy, by-and-by."

"Perhaps I am now, a little," said Hugh, blushing.

"What, already? Ah! You will do, I see. I have known old people proud
of their age, and young people of their youth. I have seen poor people
proud of their poverty; and everybody has seen rich people proud of
their wealth. I have seen happy people proud of their prosperity, and
the afflicted proud of their afflictions. Yes; people can always manage
to be proud: so you have boasted of being a Londoner up to this time;
and from this time you will hold your head high as a Crofton boy."

"How long? Till when?"

"Ah! Till when? What next! What do you mean to be afterwards?"

"A soldier, or a sailor, or a great traveller, or something of that
kind. I mean to go quite round the world, like Captain Cook."

"Then you will come home, proud of having been round the world; and you
will meet with some old neighbour who boasts of having spent all his
life in the house he was born in."

"Old Mr Dixon told mother that of himself, very lately. Oh dear, how
often does the postman come?"

"Yo