"My love he is a soldier bold,
And my love is a knight;
He girds him in a coat of mail,
When he goes forth to fight."
"That's not quite so bad as usual," said Napoleon condescendingly, toying meanwhile with the lash of an old dog-whip he had just "boned" out of the harness-room. Priscilla beamed gratefully upon her critic, and proceeded—
"He rides him forth across the sand——"
"Who rides whom?" cried Napoleon. "Didn't the fool ride a horse?"
"It means himself," said Priscilla meekly.
"Then why doesn't it say so?" cried the critic triumphantly, tapping his boot with the "boned" dog-whip just like any ordinary lord of creation in presence of his inferiors.
"It's poetry," explained Priscilla timidly.
"It's silly!" retorted Napoleon, judicially and finally.
Priscilla resumed her reading in a lower and more hurried tone. She knew that she was skating over thin ice.
"He rides him forth across the sand,
Upon a stealthy steed."