to her, but her own tactics were available. I put the
wood-lice back in my pocket, and stretching my arms yawningly above my
head, I said to Jem, "How dull it is! I wish I were a bandit."

Jem generally outdid me if possible, from sheer willingness and loyalty
of spirit.

"_I_ should like to be a burglar," said he.

And then we both left the room very quietly and politely. But when we
got outside I said, "I hate that woman."

"So do I," said Jem; "she regularly hectors over mother--I hate her
worst for that."

"So do I. Jem, doesn't she take pills?"

"I don't know--why?"

"I believe she does; I'm certain I saw a box on her dressing-table.
Jem, run like a good chap and see, and if there is one, empty out the
pills and bring me the pill-box."

Jem obeyed, and I sat down on the stairs and began to get the wood-lice
out again. There were twelve nice little black balls in my hand when Jem
came back with the pill-box.

"Hooray!" I cried; "but knock out all the powder, it might smother them.
Now, give it to me."

Jem danced with delight when I put the wood-lice in and put on the lid.

"I hope she'll shake the box before she opens it," I said, as we
replaced it on the dressing-table.

"I hope she will, or they won't be tight. Oh, Jack! Jack! _How many do
you suppose she takes at a time?_"

We never knew, and what is more, we never knew what became of the
wood-lice, for, for some reason, she kept our counsel as well as her own
about the pill-box.

One thing that helped to reconcile us to spending a good share of our
summer days in Walnut-tree Academy was that the school-mistress made us
very comfortable. Boys at our age are not very sensitive about matters
of taste and colour and so forth, but even we discovered that Mrs. Wood
had that knack of adapting rooms to their inhabitants, and making them
pleasant to the eye, which seems to be a trick at the end of some
people's fingers, and quite unlearnable by others. When she had made the
old miser's rooms to her mind, we might have understood, if we had
speculated about it, how it was that she had not profited by my mother's
sound advice to send all his "rubbishy odds and ends" (the irregularity
and ricketiness and dustiness of which made my mother shudder) to be
"sold at the nearest auction-rooms, and buy some good solid furniture of
the cabinet-maker who furnished for everybody in the neighbourhood,
which would be the cheapest in the long-run, besides making the r