So early in the morning,
So early in the morning,
Before the break of day.”
The remarkable feature of this melody was, that every verse was sung to a different air, and with a different chorus, in which we all joined lustily, and made such a din, that this time we never heard footsteps creaking along the passage, as we might have done if we had been less noisy.
But in the middle of the song the door of the room was flung open, and in stalked—the Doctor.
He cast one sharp glance at the bed, on which was spread out our feast, and another at us. We looked at one another, and then, though we were in a great fright, couldn’t help smiling, the whole thing was so ludicrous. Jack, standing on a chair, with his back turned to the door, flourishing the backbone of the duck in one hand, and a half-eaten tart in the other, had just begun a new verse—
“Old Lickemwell, he is a—”
But here, suddenly perceiving from our silence that something had gone wrong, Jack turned round, and, when he saw the Doctor, stopped short, and got down from the chair, looking foolish enough. We were all looking foolish, I dare say, but we couldn’t help laughing, and the Doctor looked as if he, too, was inclined to smile, though he was trying to look stern.
“Well,” he said at length, and then there was a portentous silence. When Dr. Lickemwell said “well,” in a peculiarly dry, meaning way which he had, we generally understood that matters were going to turn out anything but well for us. “This is how Mr. Porbury felt a smell of burning. Ah!”
Then the Doctor looked at us again, and we felt particularly uncomfortable.