It was Sunday morning and the school was in.  The classes were arranged in their accustomed order, the girls on the right, the boys on the left, against the walls; down the middle of the chapel the forms were empty; nearest to the platform on either hand of Brother Ephraim Shine, the superintendent, were the Sixth Class little boys and girls, the latter painfully starched and still, with hair tortured by many devices into damp links or wispy spirals that passed by courtesy for curls.  Very silent and submissive were little girls of Class VI., impressed by the long, lank superintendent in his Sunday black, and believing in many wonders secreted above the dusty rafters or in the wide yellow cupboards.  The first classes were nearest the door.  The young ladies, if we make reasonable allowance for an occasional natural preoccupation induced by their consciousness of the proximity of the young men, were devoted students of the gospel a interpreted by Brother Tresize, and sufficiently saintly always, presuming that no disturbing element such as a new hat or an unfamiliar dress was introduced to awaken the critical spirit.  The young men, looking in their Sunday clothes like awkward and tawdry imitations of their workaday selves, were instructed by Brother Spence; and Brother Bowden, being the kindliest, gentlest, most incapable man of the band of brothers, was given the charge of the boys’ Second Class, a class of youthful heathen, rampageous, fightable, and flippant, who made the good man’s life a misery to him, and were at war with all authority.  Peterson, Jacker Mack, Dolf Belman, Fred Cann, Phil Doon, and Dick Haddon, and a few kindred spirits composed this class; and it was sheer lust of life, the wildness of bush-bred boys, that inspired them with their irreverent impishness, although the brethren professed to discover evidence of the direct influence of a personal devil.

The superintendent arose from his stool of office and shuffled to the edge of the small platform, rattling his hymn-book for order.  Ephraim never raised his head even in chapel, but his cold, dull eyes, under their scrub of overhanging brow, missed nothing that was going on, as the younger boys often discovered to their cost.

’Dearly beloved brethren, we will open this morn-in’s service with that beautiful hymn—­’

Brother Shine stopped short.  A powerful diversion had been created by the entrance of a young man.  The new-corner was dressed like a drover, wearing a black coat over his loose blue shirt, and he carried in his right hand a coiled stockwhip.  His face had the grey tinge of wrath, and his lips were set firm on a grim determination.  He walked to a form well up in front, and seated himself, placing his big felt hat on the floor, but retaining his grip on the whip hanging between his knees.

Jacker Mack kicked Dick excitedly.  ‘Harry Hardy!’ he said.