oung Evson
will discover that he's a scamp. What _does_ it all mean?"

"It only means that Flip and I have been reading the Paradise Lost,"
said Power, laughing, "and at present Flip's mind is a Miltonic
conglomerate." And he proceeded to explain to Whalley that Ithuriel was
one of the Cherubs who guarded Eden--

("Only that in this case Eden guards the cherub," observed Henderson,
parenthetically.)

"--and who, by touching Satan with his spear, made him bound up in his
original state, when he sat like a toad squat at the ear of Eve, and,
moreover, that Uriel had recognised Satan through his mask, when,
lighting on Niphates, his looks became `Alien from heaven, with passions
foul obscured.'"

"Seriously, though," said Henderson, "Uriel must be asleep, or he
wouldn't let his little brother get under Belial's wings."

In fact, Wilton was forced to keep on the mask much longer than he had
ever meant to do. He could find no joint in Charlie's armour. The boy
was so thoroughly manly, so simple-hearted, so trustful and innocent,
that Wilton could make nothing of him. If he tried to indoctrinate
Charlie into the state of morality among the Noelites, either Charlie
did not understand him, or else quite openly expressed his disapproval
and even indignation; and when finally Wilton quite tired out, did throw
off the mask, Charlie shook him away from him, turned with a sickening
sensation from the unbared features of vice, and unfeignedly loathed the
boy who had pretended to be his friend--loathed him all the more because
he had tried to like him, but now saw the snare which was being spread
in his sight.

Every now and then during their early intercourse Charlie had felt a
certain restraint in talking to Wilton; he could not be at ease with him
though he tried. He caught the gleam of the snake through the flowers
that only half concealed his folds. And Wilton, too, had got very tired
of playing a part. He could not help his real wickedness cropping out
now and then, yet whenever it did, Charlie started in such a way that
even Wilton was ashamed; and though generally the shafts of conscience
glanced off from the panoply of steel and ice which cased this boy's
heart, yet during these days they once or twice reached the mark, and
made him smart with long-unwonted anguish. He was conscious that he was
doing the devil's work, and doing it for very poor wages, he felt now
and then Charlie's immense superiority to himsel