and oil for their hair. Corporal
punishment was altogether dispensed with by the Principal, who thought
that moral discipline was entirely sufficient to lead youth; and the
boys were so rapidly advanced in many branches of learning, that they
acquired the art of drinking spirits and smoking cigars, even before
they were old enough to enter a public school. Young Frank Clavering
stole his father's Havannahs, and conveyed them to school, or smoked
them in the stables, at a surprisingly early period of life, and at ten
years old drank his champagne almost as stoutly as any whiskered cornet
of dragoons could do.

When this interesting youth came home for his vacations Major Pendennis
was as laboriously civil and gracious to him as he was to the rest of
the family; although the boy had rather a contempt for old Wigsby, as
the Major was denominated, mimicked him behind his back, as the polite
Major bowed and smirked with Lady Clavering or Miss Amory; and drew
rude caricatures, such as are designed by ingenious youths, in which
the Major's wig, his nose, his tie, etc., were represented with artless
exaggeration. Untiring in his efforts to be agreeable, the Major wished
that Pen, too, should take particular notice of this child; incited
Arthur to invite him to his chambers, to give him a dinner at the club,
to take him to Madame Tussaud's, the Tower, the play, and so forth, and
to tip him, as the phrase is, at the end of the day's pleastres. Arthur,
who was good-natured and fond of children, went through all these
ceremonies one day; had the boy to breakfast at the Temple, where
he made the most contemptuous remarks regarding the furniture, the
crockery, and the tattered state of Warrington's dressing-gown; and
smoked a short pipe, and recounted the history of a fight between Tuffy
and Long Biggings, at Rose's, greatly to the edification of the two
gentlemen his hosts.

As the Major rightly predicted, Lady Clavering was very grateful for
Arthur's attention to the boy; more grateful than the lad himself,
who took attentions as a matter of course, and very likely had more
sovereigns in his pocket than poor Pen, who generously gave him one of
his own slender stock of those coins.

The Major, with the sharp eyes with which Nature endowed him, and with
the glasses of age and experience, watched this boy, and surveyed his
position in the family without seeming to be rudely curious about
their affairs. But, as a country neighbour,