'Methinks I see one straight line of houses there,' I observed, shading
my eyes with my hand. 'But it is distant, and the shimmer of the sun
disturbs the sight.'
'It must be the hamlet of Hindon,' said Reuben. 'Oh, the heat of this
steel coat! I wonder if it were very un-soldierly to slip it off and
tie it about Dido's neck. I shall be baked alive else, like a crab in
its shell. How say you, illustrious, is it contravened by any of those
thirty-nine articles of war which you bear about in your bosom?'
'The bearing of the weight of your harness, young man,' Saxon answered
gravely, 'is one of the exercises of war, and as such only attainable by
such practice as you are now undergoing. You have many things to learn,
and one of them is not to present petronels too readily at folk's heads
when you are on horseback. The jerk of your charger's movement even now
might have drawn your trigger, and so deprived Monmouth of an old and
tried soldier.'
'There would be much weight in your contention,' my friend answered,
'were it not that I now bethink me that I had forgot to recharge my
pistol since discharging it at that great yellow beast yesternight.'
Decimus Saxon shook his head sadly. 'I doubt we shall never make a
soldier of you,' he remarked.
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