Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: CHAPTER HI. PAYING OFF A GKUDGB. E morning after the events just related, as Ralph was on his way to school, he fell in with Willie Davenport, or Whistler, as he was often sportively called by his playmates, in allusion to his fondness for a species of music to which most boys are more or less addicted. And I may as well say here, that he was a very good whistler, and came honestly by the tille by which he was distinguished among his fellows. His quick ear caught all the new and popular melodies of the day, before they became threadbare, which gave his whistling an air of freshness and novelty that few could rival. It was to this circumstance the quality of his whistling, rather than the quantity that he was chiefly indebted for the name of Whistler. Nor was he ashamed of his nickname, as he certainly had no need 88 WHISTLER. to be; for it was not applied to him in derision, but playfully and good-naturedly. Whistler and Ralph were good friends. There was a difference of between two and three years in their ages, Whistler being about twelve years old; but their dispositions harmonized together well, and quite a strong friendship had grown up between them. A very different feelmg, however, had for some time existed between Oscar and Whistler. They were in the same class at school; but Whistler studied hard, and thus, though much younger than Oscar, he stood far before him as a scholar. This awakened some feeling of re sentment in Oscar, and he never let slip any opportuni ty for annoying or mortifying his more industrious and successful class-mate. On their way to school, on the morning in question, Ralph told Whistler of Oscars threat, and advised him to avoid his brother as much as possible, for a day or two, until the affair of the blackboard should pass fro…
