of you. You to go and play with a parcel of
sentimental girls, and dandy boys! Is that
your bringing up?"

"I didn't know they were fond of Master
Wiseman," protested Master C. J. London,
still crying.

"You didn't know, Sir!" retorted Mrs.
Bull. "Don't tell me! Then you ought to
have known. Other people knew. You were
told often enough, at the time, what it would
come to. You didn't want a ghost, I
suppose, to warn you that when they got to
candlesticks, they'd get to candles; and that
when they got to candles, they'd get to
lighting 'em; and that when they began to
put their shirts on outside, and to play at
monks and friars, it was as natural that Master
Wiseman should be encouraged to put on a
pair of red-stockings, and a red hat, and to
commit I don't know what other Tom-fooleries
and make a perfect Guy Fawkes of himself
in more ways than one. Is it because you
are a Bull, that you are not to be roused till
they shake scarlet close to your very eyes?"
said Mrs. Bull indignantly.

Master C. J. London still repeating "Oh, oh,
oh!" in a very plaintive manner, screwed his
knuckles into his eyes until there appeared
considerable danger of his screwing his eyes
out of his head. But, little John (who though
of a spare figure was a very spirited boy),
started up from the little bench on which he
sat; gave Master C. J. London a hearty pat on
the back (accompanied, however, with a slight
poke in the ribs); and told him that if
Master Wiseman, or Young England, or any
of those fellows, wanted anything for himself,
he (little John) was the boy to give it him.
Hereupon, Mrs. Bull, who was always proud
of the child, and always had been, since his
measure was first taken for an entirely new
suit of clothes to wear in Common, could not
refrain from catching him up on her knee and
kissing him with great affection, while the
whole family expressed their delight in
various significant ways.

"You are a noble boy, little John," said
Mrs. Bull, with a mother's pride, "and that's
the fact, after everything is said and done!"

"I don't know about that, Ma;" quoth
little John, whose blood was evidently up;
"but if these chaps and their backers, the
Bulls of Rome"—

Here Mr. Bull, who was only half asleep,
kicked out in such an alarming manner, that
for some seconds, his boots gyrated fitfully all
over the family hearth, filling the whole
circle with consternation. For, when Mr.
Bull did kick, his kick was tremendous.
And he always kicked, when the Bulls of
Rome were mentioned.

Mrs. Bull holding up her finger as an
injunction to the children to keep quiet,
sagely observed Mr. Bull from the opposite side
of the fireplace, until he calmly dozed again,
when she recalled the scattered family to their
former positions, and spoke in a low tone.

"You must be very careful," said the
worthy lady, "how you mention that name;
for, your poor father has so many unpleasant
experiences of those Bulls of Rome—Bless
the man! he'll do somebody a mischief."

Mr. Bull, lashing out again more violently
than before, upset the fender, knocked down
the fire-irons, kicked over the brass footman,
and, whisking his silk handkerchief off his
head, chased the Pussy on the rug clean out
of the room into the passage, and so out of
the street-door into the night; the Pussy
having, (as was well known to the children in
general,) originally strayed from the Bulls of
Rome into Mr. Bull's assembled family. After
the achievement of this crowning feat, Mr.
Bull came back, and in a highly excited state
performed a sort of war-dance in his top-boots,
all over the parlor. Finally, he sank into
his arm-chair, and covered himself up again.

Master C. J. London, who was by no
means sure that Mr. Bull in his heat would
not come down upon him for the lateness of
his exercise, took refuge behind his slate and
behind little John, who was a perfect gamecock.
But, Mr. Bull having concluded his
war-dance without injury to any one, the boy
crept out, with the rest of the family, to the
knees of Mrs. Bull, who thus addressed them,
taking little John into her lap before she
began:

"The B.'s of R.," said Mrs. Bull, getting,
by this prudent device, over the obnoxious
words, "caused your poor father a world of
trouble, before any one of you were born.
They pretended to be related to us, and to
have some influence in our family; but it
can't be allowed for a single moment—nothing
will ever induce your poor father to hear of
it; let them disguise or constrain themselves
now and then, as they will, they are, by
nature, an insolent, audacious, oppressive,
intolerable race."

Here little John doubled his fists, and began
squaring at the Bulls of Rome, as he saw
those pretenders with his mind's eye. Master
C. J. London, after some considerable reflection,
made a show of squaring, likewise.

"In the days of your great, great, great,
great, grandfather," said Mrs. Bull, dropping
her voice still lower, as she glanced at Mr.
Bull in his repose, "the Bulls of Rome were
not so utterly hateful to our family as they
are at present. We didn't know them so well,
and our family were very ignorant and low
in the world. But, we have gone on advancing
in every generation since then; and now we
are taught, by all our family history and
experience, and by the most limited exercise of
our rational faculties, That our knowledge,
liberty, progress, social welfare and happiness,
are wholly irreconcileable and inconsistent
with them. That the Bulls of Rome are not
only the enemies of our family, but of the
whole human race. That wherever they go,
they perpetuate misery, oppression, darkness,
and ignorance. That they are easily made