left to watch) in a manner they put their mouths up. With a spirited
bang they close their books, and make invitation the one to the other
for pipes and foreign cordials, recommending the chance of the time, and
the comfort away from cold water.

But, lo! I am dwelling on little things and the pigeons' eggs of the
infancy, forgetting the bitter and heavy life gone over me since then.
If I am neither a hard man nor a very close one, God knows I have had no
lack of rubbing and pounding to make stone of me. Yet can I not somehow
believe that we ought to hate one another, to live far asunder, and
block the mouth each of his little den; as do the wild beasts of the
wood, and the hairy outrangs now brought over, each with a chain upon
him. Let that matter be as it will. It is beyond me to unfold, and
mayhap of my grandson's grandson. All I know is that wheat is better
than when I began to sow it.




CHAPTER II

AN IMPORTANT ITEM

[Illustration: 005.jpg The School Room]

Now the cause of my leaving Tiverton school, and the way of it, were as
follows. On the 29th day of November, in the year of our Lord 1673, the
very day when I was twelve years old, and had spent all my substance in
sweetmeats, with which I made treat to the little boys, till the large
boys ran in and took them, we came out of school at five o'clock, as