Not that there was much of either sort of clerkship necessary; but Bruce, like Chaucer's Man of Law, was so fond of business, that he liked to seem busier than he was.

As it happened to be a half-holiday, Annie was sent with the rest of the children into the garden to play up and down the walks.
"An' min'," said Bruce, "an' haud oot ower frae the dog." In the garden Annie soon found herself at the mercy of those who had none.
It is marvellous what an amount of latent torment there is in boys, ready to come out the moment an object presents itself.

It is not exactly cruelty.

The child that tears the fly to pieces does not represent to himself the sufferings the insect undergoes; he merely yields to an impulse to disintegrate.

So children, even ordinarily good children, are ready to tease any child who simply looks teasable, and so provokes the act.