left, and the tower of Saint Sepulchre's church darting abruptly up into the sky on your right, and a gallery of bed-rooms on both sides. Just before you, you will observe a long window with the words "coffee-room" legibly painted above it; and looking out of that window, you would have seen in addition, if you had gone at the right time, Mr. Wackford Squeers with his hands in his pockets.
Mr. Squeers's appearance was not prepossessing. He had but one eye, and the popular prejudice runs in favour of two. The eye he had was unquestionably useful, but decidedly not ornamental, being of a greenish grey, and in shape resembling the fanlight of a street door. The blank side of his face was much wrinkled and puckered up, which gave him a very sinister appearance, especially when he smiled, at which times his expression bordered closely on the villanous. His hair was very flat and shiny, save at the ends, where it was brushed stiffly up from a low protruding forehead, which assorted well with his harsh voice and coarse manner. He was about two or three and fifty, and a trifle below the middle size; he wore a white neckerchief with long ends, and a suit of scholastic black, but his coat sleeves being a great deal too long, and his trousers a great deal too short, he appeared ill at ease in his clothes, and as if he were in a perpetual state of astonishment at finding himself so respectable.
Mr. Squeers was standing in a box by one of the coffee-room fire-places, fitted with one such table as is usually seen in coffee-rooms, and two of extraordinary shapes and dimensions made to suit the angles of the partition. In a corner of the seat was a very small deal trunk, tied round with a scanty piece of cord; and on the trunk was perched—his lace-up half-boots and corduroy trowsers dangling in the air—a diminutive boy, with his shoulders drawn up to his ears, and his hands planted on his knees, who glanced timidly at the schoolmaster from time to time with evident dread and apprehension.
"Half-past three," muttered Mr. Squeers, turning from the window, and looking sulkily at the coffee-room clock. "There will be nobody here to-day."
Much vexed by this reflection, Mr. Squeers looked at the little boy to see whether he was doing anything he could beat him for: as he happened not to be doing anything at all, he merely boxed his ears, and told him not to do it again.
"At Midsummer," muttered Mr. Squeers, resuming his complaint, "I took down ten boys; ten twentys—two hundred pound. I go back at eight o'clock to-morrow morning, and have got only three—three oughts an ought—three twos six—sixty pound. What's come of all the boys? what's parents got in their heads? what does it all mean?"
Here the little boy on the top of the trunk gave a violent sneeze.
"Halloa, Sir!" growled the schoolmaster, turning round. "What's that, Sir?"
"Nothing, please Sir," replied the little boy.
"Nothing, Sir!" exclaimed Mr. Squeers.
"Please Sir, I sneezed," rejoined the boy, trembling till the little trunk shook under him.
