“Young gentlemen, it has been customary — customary it has been, I say — for you to have permission to make a bonfire in the lower field, and display your fireworks, on this anniversary of the fifth of November. Little boys, take your dictionaries, and look out for the word ‘anniversary.’”

  A bustle for the books, while Mr Root plumes himself, and struts up and down. Two boys fight for the same dictionary; one of them gets a plunge on the nose, which makes him cry out — he is immediately horsed, and flogged for speaking; and, rod in hand, Mr Root continues: —

  “Young gentlemen, you know my method — my method is well known to you, I say, — to join amusement with instruction. Now, young gentlemen, the great conflagration — tenth, ninth, and eighth forms, look out the word ‘conflagration’ — the great conflagration, I say, made by this pyrotechnic display — seventh, sixth, and fifth forms, turn up the word ‘pyrotechnic.’ Mr Reynolds (the head classical master,) you will particularly oblige me by not taking snuff in that violent way whilst I am speaking, the sniffling is abominable.”

  “Turn up the word ‘sniffling,’” cries a voice from the lower end of the school. A great confusion — the culprit remains undiscovered, and some forty, at two suspected desks, are fined three-halfpence apiece. Mr Root continues, with a good deal of indignation:— “I sha’n’t allow the bonfire no more — no, not at all; nor the fireworks neither — no, nothing of no kind of the sort.” All this in his natural voice: then, swelling in dignity and in diction, “but, for the accumulated pile of combustibles, I say — for the combustible pile that you have accumulated, that you may not be deprived of the merit of doing a good action, the materials of which it is composed, that is to say, the logs of wood, and the bavins of furze, with the pole and tar-barrel, shall be sold, and the money put in the poor-box next Sunday, which I, as one of the churchwardens shall hold at the church-porch; for a charity sermon will, on that day, be preached by the Reverend Father in God, the Lord Bishop of Bristol. It is our duty, as Christians, to give eleemosynary aid to the poor; — let all classes but the first and second look out the word ‘eleemosynary.’ I say, to the poor eleemosynary aid should be given. You will also give up all the fire-works that you may have in your play-boxes, for the same laudable purpose. The servant will go round and collect them after dinner. I say, by the servant after dinner they shall all be collected. Moreover, young gentlemen, I have to tell you, that the churchwardens, and the authorities in the town, are determined to put down Guy Faux, and he shall be put down accordingly. So now, young gentlemen, you’d better take your amusements before dinner, for you will have no holiday in the afternoon, and I shall not suffer anyone to go out after tea, for fear of mischief.” Having thus spoken, he dismissed the school, and strode forth majestically.

  Oh, reader! can you conceive the dismay, the indignation, and the rage that the Court of Aldermen would display, if, when sitting down hungrily to a civic feast, they were informed that all the eatables and potatories were carried off by a party headed by Mr Scales? Can you conceive the fury that would burn in the countenances of a whole family of lordly sinecurists, at being informed, upon official authority, that henceforth their salaries would be equal to their services? No, all this you cannot conceive; nor turtle-desiring aldermen, nor cate-fed sinecurists, could, under these their supposed tribulations, have approached, in fury and hate, the meekest-spirited boys of Mr Root’s school, when they became fully aware of the extent of the tyrannous robbery about to be perpetrated. Had they not been led on by hope? Had they not trustingly eschewed Banbury-cakes — sidled by longingly the pastrycook’s — and piously withstood the temptation of hard-bake, in order that they might save up their pocket-money for this one grand occasion? and even after this, their hopes and their exertions to end in smoke? Would that it were even that; but it was decided that there should be neither fire nor smoke. Infatuated pedagogue! Unhappy decision!

  The boys did not make use of the permission to go out to play. They gathered together unanimously, in earnest knots — rebellion stalked on tip-toe from party to party: the little boys looked big, and the big boys looked bigger, and the young men looked magnificent. The half-boarders whispered their fears to the ushers, the ushers spoke under their breaths to the under-masters, the under-masters had cautious conversation with the head Latin, French, and mathematical tutors, and these poured their misgivings into the ears of the awful Dominus himself; but he only shook his powdered head in derision and disdain.

  On that cold, foggy fifth of November, we all sat down to a dinner as cold as the day, and with looks as dark as the atmosphere. Amidst the clatter of knives and forks, the rumour already ran from table to table that a horse and cart was just going to remove the enormous pile of combustibles collected for the bonfire. We had good spirits amongst us. There was an air of calm defiance on a great many. The reason was soon explained, for, before we rose from our repast, huge volumes of red flame rose from the field, — the pile had been fired in twenty places at once, and, at this sight, a simultaneous and irrepressible shout shook the walls of the school-room. The maid-servants who were attending the table, shrieking, each in her peculiar musical note, hurried out in confusion and fear; and there was a rush towards the door by the scholars, and some few got downstairs. However, the masters soon closed the door, and those who had escaped were brought back. The shutters of the windows that looked out upon the fire, were closed; and thus, in the middle of the day, we were reduced to a state almost of twilight.

  Every moment expecting actual collision with their pupils, the masters and ushers, about sixteen in number, congregated at the lower end of the room near the door, for the double purpose of supporting each other, and of making a timely escape. The half-suppressed hubbub among three hundred boys, confined in partial darkness, grew stronger each moment; it was like the rumbling beneath the earth, that precedes the earthquake. No one spoke as yet louder than the other — the master-voice had not yet risen. That dulled noise seemed like a far-off humming, and had it not been so intense, and so very human, it might have been compared to the wrath of a myriad of bees confined in the darkness of their hives, with the queen lying dead amongst them.

  Chapter Fourteen.

  Hard words the precursors of hard blows — A turn-up, to be apprehended, but not merely of polysyllables — Ralph commences raving — Root resisting — The latter gets the whip-hand of us.

  Whilst this commotion was going on in the school-room, Mr Root was active in the field, endeavouring, with the aid of the men-servants, to pluck as much fuel from the burning pile as possible. The attempt was nearly vain. He singed his clothes, and burnt his hands, lost his hat in the excitement and turmoil, and sadly discomposed his powdered ringlets. Advices were brought to him (we must now use the phrase military) of the demonstration made by the young gentlemen in the schoolroom. He hurried with the pitchfork in his hand, which he had been using, and appeared at the entrance of his pandemonium, almost, considering his demoniac look, in character. He made a speech, enforced by thumping the handle of the fork against the floor, which speech, though but little attended to, was marked by one singularity. He did not tell the lads to turn up any of his hard words. However, he hoped that the young gentlemen had yet sense of propriety enough left, to permit the servants to clear the tables of the plates, knives, forks, and other dinner appurtenances. This was acceded to by shouts of “Let them in — let them in.” The girls and the two school men-servants came in, one of the latter being the obnoxious hoister, and they were permitted to perform their office in a dead silence. It speaks well for our sense of honour, and respect for the implied conditions of the treaty, when it is remembered that this abhorred Tom, the living instrument of our tortures, and on whose back we had most of us so often writhed, was permitted to go into the darkest corners of the room unmolested, and even uninsulted. When the tables were cleared, then rung out exultingly the shout of “Bar him out — bar him out!”

  “I never yet,” roared out Mr Root, “was barred out of my own premises, and I never will be!” He was determined to resist manfully, and, if he fell, to fall like Caesar, in the capitol, decorously: so, as togae are not worn in our unclassical days, he retired to prepare himself for the contention, by getting his head newly powdered, telling his assistants to keep the position they still held, at all hazards, near the door.

  Before I narrate the ensuing struggle — a struggle that will be ever remembered in the town in which it took place, and which will serve anyone that was engaged in it, as long as he lives, to talk of with honest enthusiasm, even if he has been happy enough to have been engaged in real warfare; it is necessary to describe exactly the battle-field. The school was a parallelogram, bowed at one end, and about the dimensions of a moderately-sized chapel. It was very lofty, and, at the bowed end, which looked into the fields, there were three large windows built very high, and arched after the ecclesiastical fashion. One of the sides had windows similar to those at the end. The school-room was entered from the house by a lobby, up into which lobby, terminated a wide staircase, from the play-ground. The school-room was therefore entered from the lobby by only one large folding door. But over this end there was a capacious orchestra supported by six columns, which orchestra contained a very superb organ. The orchestra might also be entered from the house, but from a floor and a lobby above that which opened into the school-room. Consequently, at the door-end of the school-room, there was a space formed of about twelve or fourteen feet, with a ceiling much lower than the rest of the building, and which space was bounded by the six pillars that supported the gallery above. This low space was occupied by the masters and assistants — certainly a strong position, as it commanded the only outlet. The whole edifice was built upon rows of stone columns, that permitted the boys a sheltered play-ground beneath the school-room in inclement or rainy weather. The windows being high from the floor within doors, and very high indeed from the ground without, they were but sorry and dangerous means of communication, through which, either to make an escape, or bring in succours or munitions should the siege be turned to a blockade. It was, altogether, a vast, and, when properly fitted up, a superb apartment, and was used for the monthly concerts and the occasional balls.

  Time elapsed. It seemed that we were the party barred in, instead of the master being the party barred out. The mass of rebellion was as considerable as any Radical could have wished; and, as yet, as disorganised as any Tory commander-in-chief of the forces could have desired. However, Mr Root did not appear; and it having become completely dark, the boys themselves lighted the various lamps. About six or seven o’clock there was a stir among the learned guard at the door, when at length Mr Reynolds, the head classical master, having wrapped the silver top of his great horn snuff-box, in a speech, mingled, very appropriately, with Latin and Greek quotations, wished to know what it was precisely that the young gentlemen desired, and he was answered by fifty voices at once, “Leave to go into the fields, and let off the fireworks.”

  After a pause, a message was brought that this could not be granted; but, upon the rest of the school going quietly to bed, permission would be given to all the young gentlemen above fifteen years of age to go down to the town until eleven o’clock. The proposal was refused with outcries of indignation. We now had many leaders, and the shouts “Force the door!” became really dreadful. Gradually the lesser boys gave back, and the young men formed a dense front line, facing the sixteen masters, whose position was fortified by the pillars supporting the orchestra, and whose rear was strengthened by the servants of the household. As yet, the scholars stood with nothing offensive in their hands, and with their arms folded in desperate quietude. At last, there was a voice a good way in the rear, which accounts for the bravery of the owner, that shouted, “Why don’t you rally, and force the door?” Here Monsieur Moineau, a French emigré, and our Gallic tutor, cried out lustily, “You shall force that door, never — jamais, jamais — my pretty garçons, mes chers pupils, be good, be quiet — go you couch yourselves — les feux d’artifice! bah! they worth noding at all — you go to bed. Ah, ah, demain — all have congé — one two, half-holiday — but you force this door — par ma foi, é — jamais — you go out, one, two, three, four — go over dis corps, of Antoine Auguste Moineau.”

  We gave the brave fellow a hearty cheer for his loyalty; and, I have no doubt, had he he been allowed to remain, he would have been trampled to death on his post. He had lost his rank, his fortune, everything but his self-respect, in the quarrel of his king, who had just fallen on the scaffold; he had a great respect for constituted authority, and was sadly grieved at being obliged to honour heroism in spite of himself, when arrayed against it.

  Let us pause over these proceedings, and return to myself. As the rebellion increased, I seemed to be receiving the elements of a new life. My limbs trembled, but it was with a fierce joy. I ran hither and thither exultingly — I pushed aside boys three or four years older than myself — I gnashed my teeth, I stamped, I clenched my hands, — I wished to harangue, but I could not find utterance, for the very excess of thoughts. At that moment I would not be put down; I grinned defiance in the face of my late scorners; I was drunk with the exciting draught of contention. The timid gave me their fireworks, the brave applauded my resolution, and, as I went from one party to another, exhorting more by gesture than by speech, I was at length rewarded by hearing the approving shout of “Go it, Ralph Rattlin!”

  I am not fearful of dwelling too much upon the affair. It must be interesting to those amiabilities called the “rising generation,” the more especially as a “barring out” is now become matter of history. Alas! we shall never go back to the good old times in that respect, notwithstanding we are again snugly grumbling under a Whig government. Let us place at least one “barring out” upon record, in order to let the Radicals see, and seeing, hope, when they find how nearly extremes meet — what a slight step there is from absolute despotism to absolute disorganisation.

  Things were in this state, the boys encouraging each other, when, to our astonishment, Mr Root, newly-powdered, and attended by two friends, his neighbours, made his appearance in the orchestra, and incontinently began a speech. I was then too excited to attend to it; indeed, it was scarcely heard for revilings and shoutings. However, I could contain myself no longer, and I, even I, though far from being in the first rank, shouted forth, “Let us out, or we will set fire to the school-room, and, if we are burnt, you will be hung for murder.” Yes, I said those words — I, who now actually start at my own shadow — I, who when I see a stalwart, whiskered and moustached fellow coming forward to meet me, modestly pop over on the other side — I, who was in a fit of the trembles the whole year of the comet!

  “God bless me,” said Mr Root, “it is that vagabond Rattlin! I flogged the little incorrigible but eight hours ago, and now he talks about burning my house down. There’s gratitude for you! But I’ll put a stop to this at once — young gentlemen, I’ll put a stop to this at once! I’m coming down among you to seize the ringleaders, and that good-for-nothing Rattlin. Ah! the monitors, and the heads of all the classes shall be flogged; the rest shall be forgiven, if they will go quietly to bed, and give up all their fireworks.” Having so said, he descended from above with his friends, and, in about a quarter of an hour afterwards, armed with a tremendous whip, he appeared among his satellites below.

  Chapter Fifteen.

  Much excellent, and consequently useless, diplomacy displayed — A truce, and many heads broken — The battle rages; and, at length, the pueriles achieve the victory.

  The reader must not suppose that, while masters and scholars were ranged against each other as antagonists, they were quiet as statues. There was much said on both sides, reasonings, entreaties, expostulations, and even jocularity passed, between the adverse, but yet quiescent ranks. In this wordy warfare the boys had the best of it, and I’m sure the ushers had no stomach for the fray — if they fought, they must fight, in some measure, with their hands tied; for their own judgment told them that they could not be justified in inflicting upon their opponents any desperate wounds. In fact, considering all the circumstances, though they asseverated that the boys were terribly in the wrong, they could not say that Mr Root was conspicuously in the right.

  When Mr Root got among his myrmidons, he resolutely cried, “Gentlemen assistants, advance, and seize Master Atkinson, Master Brewster, Master Davenant, and especially Master Rattlin;” the said Master Rattlin having very officiously wriggled himself into the first rank. Such is the sanctity of established authority, that we actually gave back, with serried files however, as our opponents advanced. All had now been lost, even our honour, had it not been for the gallant conduct of young Henry Saint Albans, a natural son of the Duke of Y — , who was destined for the army, and, at that time, studying fortification, and to some purpose — for, immediately behind our front ranks, and while Mr Root was haranguing and advancing, Saint Albans had arranged the desks quite across the room, in two tiers, one above the other; the upper tier with their legs in the air, no bad substitute for chevaux-de-frise. In fact, this manoeuvre was an anticipation of the barricades of Paris. When the boys came to the obstacle, they made no difficulty of creeping under or jumping over it; but for the magisterial Mr Root, fully powdered; or the classical master, full of Greek; or the mathematical master, conscious of much Algebra, to creep under these desks, would have been infra dig, and for them to have leapt over was impossible. The younger assistants might certainly have performed the feat, but they would have been but scurvily treated for their trouble, on the wrong side of the barricade.

  When two antagonist bodies cannot fight, it is no bad pastime to parley. Saint Albans was simultaneously and unanimously voted leader, though we had many older than he, for he was but eighteen. A glorious youth was that Saint Albans! Accomplished, generous, brave, handsome, as are all his race, and of the most bland and sunny manners that ever won woman’s love, or softened man’s asperity. He died young — where? Where should he have died, since this world was deemed by Providence not deserving of him, but amidst the enemies of his country, her banners waving victoriously above, and her enemies flying before, his bleeding body?