The horses, handsome and brown, went on by themselves, looking by far the masters of the show.
Paul wished he were stupid.

"I wish," he thought to himself, "I was fat like him, and like a dog in the sun.

I wish I was a pig and a brewer's waggoner." Then, the room being at last empty, he would hastily copy an advertisement on a scrap of paper, then another, and slip out in immense relief.

His mother would scan over his copies.
"Yes," she said, "you may try." William had written out a letter of application, couched in admirable business language, which Paul copied, with variations.

The boy's handwriting was execrable, so that William, who did all things well, got into a fever of impatience.
The elder brother was becoming quite swanky.