bounded up and stood still as a statue at the very door-cheek, until
he heard Mistress Croale's hand upon the lock, when he bolted,
trembling with eagerness, into the entry of a court a few houses
nearer to the Widdiehill.

One after one the pitiable company issued from its paradise, and
each stumbled away, too far gone for leave-taking. Most of them
passed Gibbie where he stood, but he took no heed; his father was
always the last -- and the least capable. But, often as he left her
door, never did it close behind him until with her own eyes Mistress
Croale had seen Gibbie dart like an imp out of the court -- to take
him in charge, and, all the weary way home, hover, not very like a
guardian angel, but not the less one in truth, around the unstable
equilibrium of his father's tall and swaying form. And thereupon
commenced a series of marvellous gymnastics on the part of wee
Gibbie. Imagine a small boy with a gigantic top, which, six times
his own size, he keeps erect on its peg, not by whipping it round,
but by running round it himself, unfailingly applying, at the very
spot and at the very moment, the precise measure of impact necessary
to counterbalance its perpetual tendency to fall in one direction or
another, so that the two have all the air of a single
invention -- such an invention as one might meet with in an ancient
clock, contrived when men had time to mingle play with earnest -- and
you will have in your mind's eye a real likeness of Sir George
attended, any midnight in the week, by his son Gilbert. Home the
big one staggered, reeled, gyrated, and tumbled; round and round him
went the little one, now behind, now before, now on this side, now
on that, his feet never more than touching the ground but dancing
about like those of a prize-fighter, his little arms up and his
hands well forward, like flying buttresses. And such indeed they