So here goes!"
Casting a timid glance at Hester, in the assurance that he had set
himself thoroughly right with her, showing himself as regardful of his
boys' manners as could justly be expected of any parent, he proceeded
with his lesson from the point where he had left off.
As to breaking the boys' bones, there hardly seemed any bones in them to
break; gelatine at best seemed to be what was inside their muscles, so
wonderful were their feats, and their pranks so strange. But their
evident anxiety to please, their glances full of question as to their
success in making their offering acceptable, their unconscious efforts
to supply the lacking excitement of the public gaze, and, more than all,
the occasional appearance amidst the marvels of their performance, in
which their bodies seemed mere india-rubber in response to their wills,
of a strangely mingled touch of pathos, prevailed chiefly to interest
Hester in their endeavor. This last would appear in the occasional
suffering it caused Moxy, the youngest, to do as his father required,
but oftener in the incongruity between the lovely expression of the
boy's face, and the oddity of it when it became the field of certain
comicalities required of him--especially when, stuck through between
his feet, it had to grin like a demon carved on the folding seat of a
choir-stall.
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