It was some time past one o'clock
A.M. when John Mortimer and Brandon, who had been dining together at a
neighbour's house, one having left his father rather better, and the
other having come home from the Isle of Wight, walked up towards the
house deep in conversation, till John, lifting up his eyes, saw lights
in the schoolroom windows. This deluded father calmly remarked that the
children had forgotten to put the lamp out when they went to bed.
Brandon thought he heard a sound uncommonly like infant revelry, but he
said nothing, and the two proceeded into the closed house, and went
softly up-stairs.
"Roast pork," said Brandon, "if ever I smelt that article in my life!"
They opened the schoolroom door, and John beheld, to his extreme
surprise, a table spread, his eldest son at the head of it, his twin
daughters, those paragons of good behaviour, peeling potatoes, and the
other children, all more or less dishevelled, sitting round, blushing
and discomfited.
"My dears!" exclaimed John Mortimer, "this I never could have believed
of you! One o'clock in the morning!"
Perfect silence.
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