he cried.

“Gone!” I exclaimed. “I told you to tie him fast to the saddle!”

“Why, so I did,” he replied. “I drew the thongs so tight that they cut into his flesh. He could not have endured to pull against them.”

“Then how did he get away?”

“Why,” he answered, with a rueful countenance, “I did bind him, as I have said; but when I had done so, I bethought me of how the leather must cut, and of how pain is dreadful even to a snake, and of the injunction to do as you would be done by, and so e’en loosened his bonds. But, as I am a christened man, I thought that they would yet hold him fast!”

I began to swear, but ended in vexed laughter.