out of the room, lay back in his
chair, and laughed till he cried again.

So Amyas went back, and said that he was come to be flogged; whereon the
old schoolmaster, whose pate had been plastered meanwhile, wept tears of
joy over the returning prodigal, and then gave him such a switching as
he did not forget for eight-and-forty hours.

But that evening Sir Richard sent for old Vindex, who entered,
trembling, cap in hand; and having primed him with a cup of sack,
said--"Well, Mr. Schoolmaster! My godson has been somewhat too much for
you to-day. There are a couple of nobles to pay the doctor."

"O Sir Richard, gratias tibi et Domino! but the boy hits shrewdly
hard. Nevertheless I have repaid him in inverse kind, and set him an
imposition, to learn me one of Phaedrus his fables, Sir Richard, if you
do not think it too much."

"Which, then? The one about the man who brought up a lion's cub, and was
eaten by him in play at last?"

"Ah, Sir Richard! you have always a merry wit. But, indeed, the boy is a
brave boy, and a quick boy, Sir Richard, but more forgetful than Lethe;
and--sapienti loquor--it were well if he were away, for I shall never
see him again without my head aching. Moreover, he put my son Jack upon
the fire last Wednesday, as you would put a football, though he is a
year older, your worship, because, he said, he looked so like a roasting
pig, Sir Richard."

"Alas, poor Jack!"

"And what's more, your worship, he is pugnax, bellicosus, gladiator,
a fire-eater and swash-buckler, beyond all Christian measure; a
very sucking Entellus, Sir Richard, and will do to death some of her
majesty's lieges erelong, if he be not wisely curbed. It was but a month
agone that he bemoaned himself, I hear, as Alexander did, because there
were no more worlds to conquer, saying that it was a pity he was so
strong; for, now he had thrashed all the Bideford lads, he had no sport
left; and so, as my Jack tells me, last Tuesday week he fell upon a
young man of Barnstaple, Sir Richard, a hosier's man, sir, and plebeius
(which I consider unfit for one of his blood), and, moreover, a man full
grown, and as big as either of us (Vindex stood five feet four in his
high-heeled shoes), and smote him clean over the quay into the mud,
because he said that there was a prettier maid in Barnstaple (your
worship will forgive my speaking of such toys, to which my fidelity
compels me) than ever Bideford could show; and then offered to do the
sa