"Wait!" lifting his drumstick. "Do you understand what we are here for?"
"To learn to drum," replied Frank, in some astonishment.
"To learn to drum," repeated the veteran, a curious smile just raising the corners of that grizzled mustache. "You understand correctly. Now, am I your teacher, or are you mine?"
"You are mine, sir," answered the boy, still more amazed.
"Right again!" exclaimed the professor. "That's the way I understood it; but I might be wrong, you know. We are all liable to be wrong—are we not?"
"Yes, sir."
Frank stared.
"Good again! But now it is understood correctly; I am your instructor, and you are not mine; that is it."
Frank assented.
"Very well! Now listen. Since I am to give you lessons, and you are not to give me lessons, you will follow the method I propose, and excuse me if I decline to follow your method. That is reasonable,—isn't it?"