was time to take me in hand.

'No, Willie,' he said. 'I must teach you better than that.'

I expected him to begin by telling me that God made the wind; but,
whether it was that what the old book said about the Prince of the
Power of the Air returned upon him, or that he thought it an unfitting
occasion for such a lesson when the wind was roaring so as might render
its divine origin questionable, he said no more. Bewildered, I fancy,
with my ignorance, he turned, after a pause, to my aunt.

'Don't you think it's time for him to go to bed, Jane?' he suggested.

My aunt replied by getting from the cupboard my usual supper--a basin
of milk and a slice of bread; which I ate with less circumspection than
usual, for I was eager to return to my room. As soon as I had finished,
Nannie was called, and I bade them good-night.

'Make haste, Nannie,' I said. 'Don't you hear how the wind is roaring?'

It was roaring louder than ever, and there was the pendulum swinging
away in the window. Nannie took no notice of it, and, I presume, only
thought I wanted to get my head under the bed-clothes, and so escape
the sound of it. Anyhow, she did make haste, and in a very few minutes
I was, as she supposed, snugly settled for the night. But the moment
she shut the door I was out of bed, and at the window. The instant I
reached it, a great dash of rain swept against the panes, and the wind
howled more fiercely than ever. Believing I had the key of the
position, inasmuch as, if I pleased, I could take the pendulum to bed
with me, and stifle its motions with the bed-clothes--for this happy