"What is it about this time, Mr Wardlaw ?" "I can tell you, sir--" begins Sam eagerly.
"Be silent, sir! Well, Mr Wardlaw ?" "The boy has been very disrespectful, sir.

When I came into the class- room this morning and opened my desk, I found it contained a guinea-pig and two white mice, who had--" Here the unlucky Sam, after a desperate effort, in the course of which he has almost choked himself with a handkerchief, bursts into a laugh.
"What do you mean, sir ?" thunders the doctor.
"Oh, sir, I couldn't help it--really I couldn't; I would rather have choked than do it--it's just like me!" And he looks so distressed and humble that the doctor turns from him, and invites Mr Wardlaw to resume his impeachment.
"I have only to say that this boy, on being charged with the deed, confessed to having done it." "Oh yes, sir, that's all right--I did it; I'm very sorry; somehow I can't make out how it is I'm so bad," says Sam, with the air of one suffering from the strain of a constant anxiety.
"Don't talk nonsense, sir!" says the doctor, sternly; "you can make it out as well as I can." "Shall I hold out my hand, sir ?" says Sam, who by this time has a good idea of the routine of practice pursued in such interviews.
"No," says the doctor.

"Leave him here, Mr Wardlaw; and you," adds he, for the first time remembering that I was present--"you can go." So we departed, leaving Sam shivering and shaking in the middle of the carpet.

It was half an hour before he rejoined his schoolfellows, and this time his hands were not sore.

But somehow he managed to avoid getting into scrapes for a good deal longer than usual.