Reposing upon his easy, conscious superiority, Abel had long worshiped Hope Wayne.  They were nearly of the same age—­she a few months the younger.  But as the regulations of the school confined every boy, without especial permission of absence, to the school grounds, and as Abel had no acquaintance with Mr. Burt and no excuse for calling, his worship had been silent and distant.  He was the more satisfied that it should be so, because it had never occurred to him that any of the other boys could be a serious rival for her regard.  He was also obliged to be the more satisfied with his silent devotion, because never, by a glance, did she betray any consciousness of his particular observation, or afford him the least opportunity for saying or doing any thing that would betray it.  If he hastened to the front door of the church he could only stand upon the steps, and as she passed out she nodded to her few friends, and immediately followed her grandfather into the carriage.

When Gabriel Bennet came to Mr. Gray’s, Abel did not like him.  He laughed at him.  He made the other boys laugh at him whenever he could.  He bullied him in the play-ground.  He proposed to introduce fagging at Mr. Gray’s.  He praised it as a splendid institution of the British schools, simply because he wanted Gabriel as his fag.  He wanted to fling his boots at Gabriel’s head that he might black them.  He wanted to send him down stairs in his shirt on winter nights.  He wanted to have Gabriel get up in the cold mornings and bring him his breakfast in bed.  He wanted to chain Gabriel to the car of his triumphal progress through school-life.  He wanted to debase and degrade him altogether.

“What is it,” Abel exclaimed one day to the large boys assembled in solemn conclave in the school-room, “that takes all the boorishness and brutishness out of the English character?  What is it that prevents the Britishers from being servile and obsequious—­traits, I tell you, boys, unknown in England—­but this splendid system of fagging?  Did you ever hear of an insolent Englishman, a despotic Englishman, a surly Englishman, a selfish Englishman, an obstinate Englishman, a domineering Englishman, a dogmatic Englishman?  Never, boys, never.  These things are all taken out of them by fagging.  It stands to reason they should be.  If I shy my boots at a fellow’s head, is he likely to domineer?  If I kick a small boy who contradicts me, is he likely to be opinionated and dogmatic?  If I eat up my fag’s plum-cake just sent by his mamma, hot, as it were, from the maternal heart, and moist with a mother’s tears, is that fag likely to be selfish?  Not at all.  The boots, and the kicking, and the general walloping make him manly.  It teaches him to govern his temper and hold his tongue.  I swear I should like to have a fag!” perorated Abel, meaning that he should like to be the holy office, and to have Gabriel Bennet immediately delivered up to him for discipline.

Once Gabriel overheard this kind of conversation in the play-ground, as Abel Newt and some of the other boys were resting after a game at ball.  There were no personal allusions in what Abel had said, but Gabriel took him up a little curtly: