THE CANTERBURY PILGRIMS
returned her brother, dignifiedly. "Remember I'm a knight."
So then we sat down and had lunch, and Denny looked better. We played adverbs, and twenty questions, and apprenticing your son, for a bit in the shade, and then Dicky said it was time to set sail if we meant to make the port of Canterbury that night. Of course, pilgrims reck not of ports, but Dicky never does play the game thoughtfully.
We went on. I believe we should have got to Canterbury all right and quite early, only Denny got paler and paler, and presently Oswald saw, beyond any doubt, that he was beginning to walk lame.
"Shoes hurt you, Dentist?" he said, still with kind, striving cheerfulness.
"Not much—it's all right," returned the other.
So on we went—but we were all a bit tired now—and the sun was hotter and hotter; the clouds had gone away. We had to begin to sing to keep up our spirits. We sang "The British Grenadiers " and "John Brown's Body," which is grand to march to, and a lot of others. We were just starting on "Tramp, tramp, tramp, the boys are marching," when Denny stopped short. He stood first on one foot and then on the other, and suddenly screwed up his face and put his knuckles in his eyes and sat down on a heap of stones by the road-side.
When we pulled his hands down he was actually crying. The author does not wish to say it is babyish to cry.
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