ed him?' 'You did,
sir,' said Simcox, 'and I have lost it.' 'Lost it!' said I.
'You but confirm me in my decision that henceforth, when any boy in
this school needs caning, I will do it with my own hands.' 'Sir,' he
replied, 'you have done that for these five years. Forgive me, but I
was pleased to find that you never asked to see the book; for I
really couldn't bring myself to flog a boy merely for the sake of
writing up an entry.' In short, that man was a born schoolmaster,
and almost dispensed with punishments, even the slightest."

"He ruled the boys by kindness, I suppose?"

"He wasn't quite such a fool."

"Then what was his secret?"

"Bad temper. They held him in a holy terror; and it's all the
queerer because he wasn't even just."

Brother Bonaday shook his head.

"I don't understand," he said; "but if you believe so little in
punishment, why are we proposing to punish Corona?"

"Obviously, my dear fellow, because we can find no better way.
The child must not be suffered to grow up into a termagant--you will
admit that, I hope? . . . Very well, then: feeble guardians that we
are, we must do our best."

He knocked at the bedroom door and, after a moment, entered.
Corona sat on the edge of her bed, dry-eyed, hugging Timothy to her
breast.

"Corona!"

"Yes, Uncle Copas?"

"You have been extremely naughty, and probably know that you have to
be punished."

"I dare say it's the best you can do," said Corona, after weighing
this address or seeming to do so. The answer so exactly tallied with
the words he had spoken a moment ago that Brother Copas could not
help exclaiming--

"Ah! You overheard us, just now?"

"I may have my faults," said Corona coldly, candidly, "but I am not
a listener."

"I--I beg your pardon," stammered Brother Copas, somewhat abashed.
"But the fact remains that your behaviour to Nurse Turner has been
most disrespectful, and your language altogether unbecoming.
You have given your father and me a great shock: and I am sure you
did not wish to do that."

"I'm miserable enough, if that's what you mean," the child confessed,
still hugging her golliwog and staring with haggard eyes at the
window. "But if you want me to say that I'm sorry--"

"That is just what I want you to say."

"Well, then, I can't. . . . Nurse Turner's a beast--a _beast_--a
BEAST!"

Corona's face whitened, and her voice shrilled higher at each
repetition.

"--She hates Branny like poison, and