“Dissipated? Bob, was there ever impudence like that? These fellows’ll get more instructions than old Sol can give them before they’re many days older. Robert, my boy, did you hear what they said about you?”
Bob was pawing the eels with a very discontented sort of whine, and did not take up the insult with any spirit.
“They said you had a dissipated look, Robert. Well, so you have, and I mustn’t keep you out so late o’ nights any more. But won’t I get even with that pair before I’m done with ’em!”
Zeb Fuller had very plainly had his own way too much in Ogleport, and his rustic narrowness had got him into a very bad state of mind. In fact, he and his friends had too much accustomed themselves, in a thoroughly Saxonish way, to regard the entire race of Academy “boarders” as a very undesirable lot of “foreigners,” if not, also, as a kind of “invaders,” to whom small mercy belonged on the part of himself and the other “natives.”
CHAPTER XX
THE BOXING MATCH
The rest of that night was reasonably calm, and Bar and Val slept soundly, without any fear of trouble in the belfry, nor did they fail to promptly answer the bell for breakfast.
After that, a trip to the lake, a look at Puff Evans and his workshop, and a few hours of fishing, followed, as a matter of course, only Bar Vernon discovered that he was not going to go through the Greek grammar “across lots,” as he had begun to do with the Latin.
They found Puff rapidly becoming absorbed and enthusiastic about his new boat.