WITH this excursion into the natural history of the Smoutchy Boy, which perhaps ought to have come somewhat earlier in the history, we continue the tale of the adventures of General Napoleon Smith.
Beaten down by numbers, the hero lay on the ground at the corner of the butcher's parks. Nipper Donnan stood over him and held him down with his foot. They were just the right ages for bully and bullied. Hugh John Smith was twelve, slim, and straight as an arrow; Nipper Donnan sixteen, short, hard, and thick set, with large solid hands and prominent knuckles.
"Got you at last, young prig! Now I'll do you to rights!" remarked Nipper, genially kicking Hugh John in the ribs with his hobnailed boots.
Hugh John said not a word, for he had fought till there was no more breath left in him anywhere.
"Sulky, hey?" said Nipper, with another kick in a more tender spot. Hugh John winced. "Ah, lads, I thought that would wake the young swell up. Oh, our father is the owner of this property, is he? So nice! He owns the town, does he? Nasty pauper he is! Too poor to keep a proper carriage, but thinks us all dirt under his feet. Yaw, yaw, we aw-w so fine, we aw-w, we a-aw!"
And Nipper Donnan imitated, amid the mean obsequious laughter of his fighting tail, the erect carriage of his father's enemy, Mr. Picton Smith, as he was accustomed to stride somewhat haughtily down the High Street of Edam.
Then he came back and kicked Hugh John again.
"You wouldn't dare to do this if my father were here!" said General Napoleon, now sitting up on his elbow.
"Your father, I'll show you!" shouted furiously Nipper the Tyrant. "Who asked you to come here anyway to meddle with us? Who invited you into our parks? What business have you in our castle? Fetch him along, boys; we'll show him something that neither he nor his father know anything about. They and the likes of them used to shut up people in the castle dungeons, so they say. We are just the boys to give 'em a taste of what it is like theirselves."