keelhauling--for the reviewers of the period were patriotic, and the

English public anti-Gallic--Frank quitted his chambers at Lincoln's Inn,

and came home to be comforted for Christmas. This was the wisest thing

that he could do, though he felt that it was not Harmodian. In spite of

all crotchets, he was not a bad fellow, and not likely to make a good

lawyer.

As the fates would have it (being naturally hostile to poets who defy

them), by the same coach to Stonnington came Master Johnny, in high

feather for his Christmas holidays. Now these two brothers were as

different of nature as their sisters were, or more so; and unlike the

gentler pair, each of these cherished lofty disdain for the other. Frank

looked down upon the school-boy as an unlicked cub without two

ideas; the bodily defect he endeavoured to cure by frequent outward

applications, but the mental shortcoming was beneath his efforts. Johnny

meanwhile, who was as hard as nails, no sooner recovered from a thumping

than he renewed and redoubled his loud contempt for a great lout over

six feet high, who had never drawn a sword or pulled a trigger. And now

for the winter this book would be a perpetual snowball for him to pelt

his big brother with, and yet (like a critic) be scarcely fair object

for a hiding. In season out of season, upstairs down-stairs, even in

the breakfast and the dinner chambers, this young imp poked clumsy

splinters--worse than thorns, because so dull--into the tender poetic

side; and people, who laugh at the less wit the better, laughed very

kindly, to please the boy, without asking whether they vexed the man.

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