"O, dear!" he said to himself; "have I got to take that awful, sickish, nasty stuff?"
The next morning, about half an hour before school-time, Rich wanted Dan.
"The poor child is not well, Mr. Richardson, and has gone into the unfinished room to take some medicine. He says he can take it better if he is alone, and nobody looking at him. I wish he didn't dislike to take medicine so much; if it was not such a trial to him, I should give him 'picra.'"
When Rich entered the room, Dan had got up a brick in the hearth, and was administering the salts and senna to the cross-sill beneath. He started like a guilty thing when the door opened, but, seeing who it was, completed his purpose.
"What are you about, Daniel?"
"Taking salts and senna, sir."
"Is that the way you always take them?"
"I never took any so before; but this is the way I mean to take them for the future. I expect to pour gallons into this hole."
"Are you well enough to get me a big log out of the wood-pile?"
"Certainly, Mr. Richardson. I never was weller in my life."