"William Makepeace Thackeray. Vanity fair" - читать интересную книгу автора

reverie; and looking up, he saw Cuff before him,
belabouring a little boy.

It was the lad who had peached upon him about the
grocer's cart; but he bore little malice, not at least
towards the young and small. "How dare you, sir, break
the bottle?" says Cuff to the little urchin, swinging a
yellow cricket-stump over him.

The boy had been instructed to get over the playground
wall (at a selected spot where the broken glass had been
removed from the top, and niches made convenient in
the brick); to run a quarter of a mile; to purchase a pint
of rum-shrub on credit; to brave all the Doctor's outlying
spies, and to clamber back into the playground again;
during the performance of which feat, his foot had slipt,
and the bottle was broken, and the shrub had been spilt,
and his pantaloons had been damaged, and he appeared
before his employer a perfectly guilty and trembling,
though harmless, wretch.

"How dare you, sir, break it?" says Cuff; "you blundering
little thief. You drank the shrub, and now you pretend
to have broken the bottle. Hold out your hand, sir."

Down came the stump with a great heavy thump on
the child's hand. A moan followed. Dobbin looked up.
The Fairy Peribanou had fled into the inmost cavern
with Prince Ahmed: the Roc had whisked away Sindbad
the Sailor out of the Valley of Diamonds out of sight, far
into the clouds: and there was everyday life before
honest William; and a big boy beating a little one
without cause.

"Hold out your other hand, sir," roars Cuff to his little
schoolfellow, whose face was distorted with pain.
Dobbin quivered, and gathered himself up in his narrow old
clothes.

"Take that, you little devil!" cried Mr. Cuff, and down
came the wicket again on the child's hand.-Don't be
horrified, ladies, every boy at a public school has done it.
Your children will so do and be done by, in all
probability. Down came the wicket again; and Dobbin
started up.

I can't tell what his motive was. Torture in a public
school is as much licensed as the knout in Russia. It
would be ungentlemanlike (in a manner) to resist it.
Perhaps Dobbin's foolish soul revolted against that exercise