I was so jolly miserable at first that I made up my
mind to run away and go back home."

"But you did not?" I said eagerly, for, though I felt better now in the
interest of meeting fresh people and learning something about the place,
I could fully appreciate his words.

"No, I didn't," he said thoughtfully. "You see, I knew I must come to
school, and if I ran away from this one, if I hadn't been sent back, I
should have been sent back to another one, and there would have been
whackings at home, and they would have hurt my mother, who always hated
to see me have it, though I always deserved it: father said so. Then
there would have been whackings here, and they'd have hurt me, so I made
up my mind to stay."

"That was wise," I said, laughing.

"Oh, I don't know," he replied, wrinkling up his face; "the cane only
hurts you outside, and it soon goes off, but being miserable hurts you
inside, and lasts ever so long. I say, don't you be miserable about
coming away from home. You'll soon get over it, and there's lots of
things to see. Look there," he cried, stopping at the edge of the road,
"you can see the sea here. The doctor will give us leave to go some
day, and we shall bathe. There it is. Don't look far off, does it? but
it's six miles. But we've got a bathing pool, too. See those woods?"

"Yes," I said, as I gazed over the beautiful expanse of hill and dale,
with a valley sweeping right away to the glittering sea.

"Those are the General's, where the pheasants are, and if you look
between those fir-trees you can just get a peep of the hammer pond where
the big eels are."

"Yes, I can see the water shining in the sun," I said eagerly.

"Yes, that's it; and those fields where you see the tall poles dotted
over in threes and fours are--I say, did you ever see hops?"

"Yes, often," I said; "great, long, tight, round sacks piled-up on
waggons."

"Yes, that's how they go to market. I mean growing?"

"No."

"Those are hops, then, climbing up the poles. That's where the
partridges get. Oh, I say, I wish old Magg would sell us that gun.
We'd go halves in buying it, and I'd play fair; you should shoot just as
often as I did."

"But he will not sell it," I said.

"Oh, he will some day, when he wants some money."

"And what would Doctor Browne do if he knew?"

"Smug it!" said Mercer, with a comical look, "when he knew. Look! see
that open ground there with the clump of fir-trees and the long slo