home; and having taken counsel with himself, went to his mother, and
said, "Please, mother, I've broken schoolmaster's head."

"Broken his head, thou wicked boy!" shrieked the poor widow; "what didst
do that for?"

"I can't tell," said Amyas, penitently; "I couldn't help it. It looked
so smooth, and bald, and round, and--you know?"

"I know? Oh, wicked boy! thou hast given place to the devil; and now,
perhaps, thou hast killed him."

"Killed the devil?" asked Amyas, hopefully but doubtfully.

"No, killed the schoolmaster, sirrah! Is he dead?"

"I don't think he's dead; his coxcomb sounded too hard for that. But had
not I better go and tell Sir Richard?"

The poor mother could hardly help laughing, in spite of her terror,
at Amyas's perfect coolness (which was not in the least meant for
insolence), and being at her wits' end, sent him, as usual, to his
godfather.

Amyas rehearsed his story again, with pretty nearly the same
exclamations, to which he gave pretty nearly the same answers; and
then--"What was he going to do to you, then, sirrah?"

"Flog me, because I could not write my exercise, and so drew a picture
of him instead."