mall boy
quite superfluously.

"And do you like it, dear?"

"Very much indeed."

"What is Emery reading to you about? Is it about Heaven?"

"No, it's about 'ell," gleefully responded the little boy, who had not
yet found all his "h's."

Those glowing furnace-bars; those roaring flames ... there could be no
doubt whatever about it. A hymn spoke of "Gates of Hell" ... of course
they just called it the heating furnace to avoid frightening him. The
little boy became acutely conscious of his misdeeds. He had taken ...
no, stolen an apple from the nursery pantry and had eaten it. Against
all orders he had played with the taps in the sink. The burden of his
iniquities pressed heavily on him; remembering the encouraging warnings
Mrs. Fairchild, of The Fairchild Family, gave her offspring as to their
certain ultimate destiny when they happened to break any domestic rule,
he simply dared not pass those fiery apertures alone. With his hand in
that of his friend Joseph, the footman, it was quite another matter.
Out of gratitude, he addressed Joseph as "Mr. Greatheart," but Joseph,
probably unfamiliar with the Pilgrim's Progress, replied that his name
was Smith.

The interminable labyrinth of passages threaded, the warm, comfortable
housekeeper's room, with its red curtains, oak presses and a delicious
smell of spice pervading it, was a real haven of rest. To this very
day, nearly sixty years afterwards, it still looks just the same, and
keeps its old fragrant spicy odour. Common politeness dictated a brief
period of conversation, until Mrs. Pithers, the housekeeper, should
take up her wicker key-basket and select a key (the second press on the
left). From that inexhaustible treasure-house dates and figs would
appear, also dried apricots and those little discs of crystallised
apple-paste which, impaled upon straws, and coloured green, red and
yellow, were in those days manufactured for the special delectation of
greedy little boys. What a happy woman Mrs. Pithers must have been with
such a prodigal wealth of delicious products always at her command! It
was comforting, too, to converse with Mrs. Pithers, for though this
intrepid woman was alarmed neither by bears, hunchbacks nor crocodiles,
she was terribly frightened by what she termed "cows," and regulated
her daily walks so as to avoid any portion of the park where cattle
were grazing. Here the little boy experienced a delightful sense of
masculine superiority. He was not