CHAPTER VII.
THE GREAT PLAGUE.
“Fools make a mock at sin.”—Prov. xiv. 9.
“What a violent storm is raging!” said Thorn the teacher to his scholars, as, after having dismissed them at the close of the school hours, he found them clustering together in the porch, afraid of venturing forth into the pelting rain, pouring down in large, heavy drops, mingled with hail, which danced on the wet, brown pavement. “Come back into the room, my children: it is better than standing there in the cold. Amuse yourselves as you like until the weather clears up, while I occupy myself with reading.”
The boys gladly availed themselves of the permission, and began to play together in one part of the room, while the weary teacher sat down in another, rested his pale brow on his hand, and tried, as far as the noise and talking would let him, to forget his fatigue in a book.
He soon, however, found it impossible not to hear what was passing; his eye rested, indeed, on the page, but his mind could not take in the sense of it. He loved his pupils too well to think that his care of them should end with the hours of study: he looked on the immortal beings committed to his charge as those for whom he must one day render an account to his God and theirs.
“No, we’re all tired of that!” cried the voice of Bat Nayland, as some well-known game was proposed. “I know something that will give us a deal more fun: let’s play at the highwayman and the judge!”
“What’s that? what’s that?” cried a dozen young voices.
“Oh! it’s what I saw at the penny theatre, about a clever thief robbing a judge: only think—robbing a judge!” The last words were repeated around the room in various tones of amusement and surprise.