"How are your sore knees?" said Mercer one morning soon after my long
first lesson in riding.
"Oh, dreadful!" I cried. "They get a little better, and then the
riding makes them bad again."
"But why don't he let you have a saddle?"
"He does now," I said--"that is, he did yesterday; but it's worse riding
on a saddle, it's so slippery, and he will not let me have any
stirrups."
"When are you going again?"
"To-day, I suppose. The Doctor says I'm to get on as fast as possible,
and make up with my other studies afterwards."
"Wish I was going to learn to ride."
"You wouldn't much like it if you had to," I replied. "Oh, I don't
know. It looks very nice to see you going along. But, I say, it does
make Burr major so wild. I heard him tell Dicksee he should make his
father send him a horse, and Dicksee said he ought to, and I laughed."
"Did he hear you?"
"Yes, and gave me such a clip on the head with a cricket stump. Feel
here."