ittle extra exertion
will teach him the advantage of diligence at the proper season. Lost
ground must be regained. I need scarcely ask whether you've executed
your appointed task, my dear? You're never behindhand."

Thames turned away at the question, which he felt might be construed
into a reproach. But Sheppard answered for him.

"Darrell's job was done early this morning," he said; "and if I'd
attended to his advice, the packing-case would have been finished at the
same time."

"You trusted too much to your own skill, Jack," rejoined Thames. "If I
could work as fast as you, I might afford to be as idle. See how he gets
on, father," he added, appealing to Wood: "the box seems to grow under
his hands."

"You're a noble-hearted little fellow, Thames," rejoined Wood, casting a
look of pride and affection at his adopted son, whose head he gently
patted; "and give promise of a glorious manhood."

Thames Darrell was, indeed, a youth of whom a person of far greater
worldly consequence than the worthy carpenter might have been justly
proud. Though a few months younger than his companion Jack Sheppard, he
was half a head taller, and much more robustly formed. The two friends
contrasted strikingly with each other. In Darrell's open features,
frankness and honour were written in legible characters; while, in
Jack's physiognomy, cunning and knavery were as strongly imprinted. In
all other respects they differed as materially. Jack could hardly be
accounted good-looking: Thames, on the contrary, was one of the
handsomest boys possible. Jack's complexion was that of a gipsy;
Darrell's as fresh and bright as a rose. Jack's mouth was coarse and
large; Darrell's small and exquisitely carved, with the short, proud
upper lip, which belongs to the highest order of beauty. Jack's nose was
broad and flat; Darrell's straight and fine as that of Antinous. The
expression pervading the countenance of the one was vulgarity; of the
other, that which is rarely found, except in persons of high birth.
Darrell's eyes were of that clear gray which it is difficult to
distinguish from blue by day and black at night; and his rich brown
hair, which he could not consent to part with, even on the promise of a
new and modish peruke from his adoptive father, fell in thick glossy
ringlets upon his shoulders; whereas Jack's close black crop imparted
the peculiar bullet-shape we have noticed, to his head.

While Thames modestly expressed a hope that he m