and effect, and the cause for the effect here was--poor little Sophy.

The day was fresh, with a lovely breeze, as the two riders rode briskly
over the turf of rolling commons, with the feathery boughs of
neighbouring woodlands tossed joyously to and fro by the sportive summer
wind. The exhilarating exercise and air raised Lionel's spirits, and
released his tongue from all trammels; and when a boy is in high spirits,
ten to one but he grows a frank egotist, feels the teeming life of his
individuality, and talks about himself. Quite unconsciously, Lionel
rattled out gay anecdotes of his school-days; his quarrel with a
demoniacal usher; how he ran away; what befell him; how the doctor went
after, and brought him back; how splendidly the doctor behaved,--neither
flogged nor expelled him, but after patiently listening, while he rebuked
the pupil, dismissed the usher, to the joy of the whole academy; how he
fought the head boy in the school for calling the doctor a sneak; how,
licked twice, he yet fought that head boy a third time, and licked him;
how, when head boy himself, he had roused the whole school into a civil
war, dividing the boys into Cavaliers and Roundheads; how clay was rolled
out into cannon-balls and pistol-shots, sticks shaped into swords, the
playground disturbed to construct fortifications; how a slovenly stout
boy enacted Cromwell; how he himself was elevated into Prince Rupert; and
how, reversing all history, and infamously degrading Cromwell, Rupert
would not consent to be beaten; and Cromwell at the last, disabled by an
untoward blow across the knuckles, ignominiously yielded himself
prisoner, was tried by a court-martial, and sentenced to be shot! To all
this rubbish did Darrell incline his patient ear,--not encouraging, not
interrupting, but sometimes stifling a sigh at the sound of Lionel's
merry laugh, or the sight of his fair face, with heightened glow on his
cheeks, and his long silky hair, worthy the name of lovelocks, blown by
the wind from the open loyal features, which might well have graced the