Schools vary. Sanstead House belonged to the more difficult class.
Mr Abney's constant flittings did much to add to the burdens of
his assistants, and his peculiar reverence for the aristocracy did
even more. His endeavour to make Sanstead House a place where the
delicately nurtured scions of the governing class might feel as
little as possible the temporary loss of titled mothers led him
into a benevolent tolerance which would have unsettled angels.

Success or failure for an assistant-master is, I consider, very
much a matter of luck. My colleague, Glossop, had most of the
qualities that make for success, but no luck. Properly backed up
by Mr Abney, he might have kept order. As it was, his class-room
was a bear-garden, and, when he took duty, chaos reigned.

I, on the other hand, had luck. For some reason the boys agreed to
accept me. Quite early in my sojourn I enjoyed that sweetest triumph
of the assistant-master's life, the spectacle of one boy smacking
another boy's head because the latter persisted in making a noise
after I had told him to stop. I doubt if a man can experience so
keenly in any other way that thrill which comes from the knowledge
that the populace is his friend. Political orators must have the
same sort of feeling when their audience clamours for the ejection
of a heckler, but it cannot be so keen. One is so helpless with boys,
unless they decide that they like one.

It was a week from the beginning of the term before I made the
acquaintance of the Little Nugget.

I had kept my eyes open for him from the beginning, and when I
discovered that he was not at school, I had felt alarmed. Had