O'Demagogue, whose custom was to breakfast in the school, and who never let young Travers want employment, if he could help it, gave him a muffin, and told him to heat it. The boy took the cake, but made better use of his time; for when his master call'd to him, and ask'd, whether he had done what he order'd him, with the muffin, he said "Yes, sir, I have done what you order'd me, exactly; I have eat it."-" Eat it?" cried the enraged O'Demagogue. "You little, infernal villain! I told you to heat it."

"So you did, sir," replied Philip; "but, you know, you said-H was no letter !"

CHAPTER III.

Away went Gilpin, neck or nought,
Away went hat and wig;
He little dreamt, when he set out,
Of running such a rig!

COWPER.

THE leading trait, and one of the few blemishes, in Philip's character, was an extreme warmth of temper, which, ultimately, was the cause of much inquietude to him. He could not, even from infancy, brook the slightest shadow of an insult, without resentment; but that resentment once evinced, the offence was effaced from his memory-save where Mr. O'Demagogue was concern'd; towards him the youth was inexorable, and the flogging he received, for concurring in opinion with his master (that

H was no letter) was the ground-work of as strong an inveteracy as ever subsisted between two human beings.

The day subsequent to the one just mention'd, he tore a sheet of writing paper into long strips, and roll'd them up in the form of darts; these he discharged, with such admirable dexterity, from between his forefingers, at the very enormous wig of his preceptor, that the decorations of his caxon resembled

"Quills upon the fretful porcupine."

Being discover'd, he underwent a second castigation, and a much severer one than the former; but which did not, by any means, tend to lower his spirit: it is true, he continued quiet for some months; but, no sooner was the winter set in, with a hard frost, than a scheme, which he had long had in contemplation, was put into effect, in the following manner :

The pedagogue had been presented, by. the father of one of his pupils, (who was an East-Indian) with a buffalo, on which he

set great value; and which, from the resemblance his bushy frontlet, and excrescence between the shoulders, gave him to his present owner, Philip called Dennis. This animal had the run of a field, at the back of the garden, and was to be one of the engines of his plot. Philip scaled the garden-wall, (at a time he knew himself observed by his master) caught the buffalo, and was galloping him, at a desperate rate, over the turf, when O'Demagogue open'd the gate. This was what the youth wish'd, and expected: after a time, spent on his part in exercising the animal, and on that of his master in fruitless execrations, the former dismounted, and made towards a piece of water, which was frozen over, and, leaping from the bank, gain'd the centre of it, while his pursuer endeavour'd to follow by the only beaten way; but (awful to relate!) he had not taken above three steps, when the treacherous ice gave way, and his lower half was immersed in water, while the upper part of him somewhat resembled the ghost of Gaffer Thumb, when it appears to the terrified King Arthur; and thus he re

main'd, without hat or wig, (for he had lost them in the chace) grinning and chattering like an angry baboon.

There Philip left him, exulting in his victory; for, be it known, he had contrived to cut a sort of trap-door in the ice, (about a yard from the only part of the margin that was easy of access) through which, as he had surmised, and has been seen, the illstarr'd wight made a descent, and crown'd the scheme with success, beyond the projector's most sanguine expectations.

The luckless object of his resentment having extricated himself from his disagreeable situation, though not without some difficulty, return'd to his house, shivering with cold, and dripping wet, and rung for his old housekeeper; to whom, having imparted the nature of his disaster, he said"Och! Mrs. Deborah, I thought I was going to the shades of Clinturf! I'm as dead a man as ever I was in my life! thought I. Do, honey, make me a pint of half and half, quite hot; put it into one mug, and be sure you don't mix it."

For the last harmless humor, Philip was