Mr. Caesar gave his answer with some emphasis: 

“Will—­you—­all—­sit—­down?”

This rhetorical question being in the nature of a command, we sullenly complied, tossing our heads to show our sense of the indignity to which we had been submitted.  Pennybet, meanwhile, continued to turn his handle in a leisurely fashion and touch his forehead like an organ-grinder.

Mr. Caesar looked at him angrily and pathetically, conscious of his powerlessness.

“Que faites vous, Pennybet?  Asseyez vous toute suite!”

“Yes, sir,” answered Penny, who had no sympathy with German, French, or any of these ludicrous languages.  “Yes, sir, we had two, and one died.”

“Que voulez vous dire?  Allez a votre place!”

“It’s all right, sir, if you cross your fingers,” suggested Penny.

Poor Mr. Caesar made a movement, as though he would go and push the mutineer to his place.

“You will go to your seat immediately, Pennybet,” he ordered.

Penny cocked his head on one side.  “Oh, sir,” said he reproachfully.

Our friend always expressed his sense of injustice with this sad “Oh, sir,” and, as he generally detected a vein of injustice in any demand made upon him, the expression was of frequent occurrence.

Mr. Caesar first moved his lips incompetently, and then, with a studied slowness that was meant to sound imperious, began: 

“When I say ’Sit’—­”

“You mean ‘Sit,’” explained Penny promptly.

“That’s impertinence.”

But Penny had his head thrown back, and was gazing out of eyes, curtained by the fall of heavy-fringed lids, at the ceiling.

“Pennybet,” cried his master, his very voice apprehensive, “will you have the goodness to attend?”

“Oh, ah, yes, sir,” agreed Penny, awaking from his reverie.

“You haven’t the manners of a savage, boy.”

“Oh, sir.”

Mr. Caesar bit his lip, and his silver voice would scarcely come.

“Or of a pig!”

“Would a pig have manners, sir?” corrected Penny.

“That’s consummate impudence!”

“Oh, is it, sir?” Penny’s tone suggested that he was grateful for the enlightenment.  Henceforth he would not be in two minds on the subject.

Mr. Caesar, repulsed again by the more powerful character of the boy, tried to cover the feebleness of his position by sounding as threatening as possible.

“Go to your seat at once!  The impudence of this class is insufferable!”

Loud murmurs of dissent from twenty boys greeted this aspersion.  The class resolved itself into an Opposition, inspired by one object, which was to repudiate aspersions.  Penny excellently voiced their resentment.

“Oh, sir.” (Opposition cheers.)

Mr. Caesar hurled his chair behind him, and approached very close to Penny.

“Will you go to your seat at once?”