THE GRAVE ACT OF DISOBEDIENCE. 41 thought it would never end. He could scarcely persuade himself it was the same staircase he was accustomed to bound - so lightly down in the mornings, and which did not then seem more than a dozen steps. More than once in his descent he paused to make sure that he was not observed, and fancied he heard distant noises; but when he listened all was quiet around him, save the slow ticking of the staircase clock. Arrived at the foot of the stairs, he had still three rooms to pass through be- fore he reached the playground; the dining-room, the school-room itself, and an outer room, in which the boys’ trunks were kept, and which went commonly by the name of the marching-room, because in rainy weather the boys used to have their drilling-lesson there. The doors of 6