Stalky & Co.

Western wind and open surge Tore us from our mothers; Flung us on a naked shore (Twelve bleak houses by the shore! Seven summers by the shore!) ’Mid two hundred brothers.

The boys did not concern themselves with lessons for the next few days. They had all Colonel Dabney’s estate to play with, and they explored it with the stealth of Red Indians a...

“Right, O! Led away by bad companions in the execution of his duty or--or words to that effect. You’re dismissed with a reprimand, Foxy. _We_ won’t tell about _you_. I swear we...

“Not the least good having a row with a master unless you can make an ass of him,” said Stalky, extended at ease on the hearth-rug. “If Mason didn’t know Number Five--well, he’s...

“Ah, ha!” said he, turning to show the light of his countenance. “Here we have the ornaments of the Casual House at last. You consider cricket beneath you, I believe”--the crowd...

“Stale!” Stalky shouted. “We knew that years ago, only we didn’t choose to run about shoutin’ ‘stinker.’ We’ve got some manners, if they haven’t. Catch a fag, Turkey, and make s...

“Than any hushed-up scandal could? Quite so. Our reputation among the farmers is most unsavory. But I would much sooner deal with any amount of ingenious crime of that nature th...

“It is.” McTurk had adopted a ghastly solemnity that sat well on his long, lean face. “Hang it all! A prefect’s one thing and an usher’s another; but you seem to combine ’em. Yo...

“Decent and self-respecting. As for the other boy, whoever he is, you can use your influence”--a purely secular light flickered in the chaplain’s eye--“in any way you please to-...

“‘The only son of his mother, and she a widow.’ That is the least reasonable sort.” The chaplain read with pursed lips. “If half those charges are true he should be in the sick-...

The technique of that match belongs to a bygone age. Scrimmages were tight and enduring; hacking was direct and to the purpose; and around the scrimmage stood the school, crying...

“But you should have a cadet-corps.” The General pursued his own line of thought. “You _shall_ have a cadet-corps, too, if my recommendation in Council is any use. I don’t know...

“That was his giddy patriotism,” Beetle explained. After tea they joined the rush for seats, secured a private and invisible corner, and began to criticise. Every gas-jet was li...

McTurk planted one foot firmly against the inner door lest Mother Yeo should return inopportunely, for Mary’s face was set. It was then that Tulke found his way blocked by a tal...

“Oh, it was a giddy time,” said Beetle, afterwards, in dismantled Number Five. “He gibbered a bit, and I kept him on the gibber, and then he dictated about a half of Dolabella &...

“And out he gat,” said Dick Four. “As soon as it was dark, and he’d had a bit of a snooze, him and thirty Sikhs went down through the staircase in the tower, every mother’s son...