“Here,” said Bevis, throwing the remainder of the cherries out like a shower among them. “Are you coming to quoits?” “O! no,” said Mark, “we have so much to do; now go away.” The soldiery moved off through the garden, snatching lawlessly at any fruit they saw. “Mark,” said Bevis on his knees again, “these sails will have to be hemmed, you know.” “So they will.” “We can’t do it. You must take them home to Frances, and make her stitch them; roll them up and go directly.” “I don’t want to go home,” said Mark. “And perhaps she won’t stitch them.” “I’m sure she will; she will do anything for me.” “So she will,” said Mark rather sullenly. “Everybody does everything for you.” Bevis had rolled up the sails, quite indifferent as to what people did for him, and put them into Mark’s unwilling hands. “Now you can have the donkey, and mind and come back before breakfast.” “I can’t catch him,” said Mark. “No; no more can I--stop. John Young’s sure to be in the stable, he can.” “Ah,” said Mark, brightening up a little, “that moke is a beast.” John Young, having stipulated for a “pot,” went to catch the donkey; they sat down in the shed to wait for him, but as he did not come for some time they went after him. They met him in the next field leading the donkey with a halter, and red as fire from running. They took the halter and sent John away for the “pot.” There was a wicked thought in their hearts, and they wanted witnesses away. So soon as John had gone, Mark looked at Bevis, and Bevis looked at Mark. Mark growled, Bevis stamped his feet. “Beast!” said Mark. “Wretch!” said Bevis. “You--you--you, Thing,” said Mark; they ground their teeth, and glared at the animal. They led him all fearful to a tree, a little tree but stout enough; it was an ash, and it grew somewhat away from the hedge. They tied him firmly to the tree, and then they scourged this miserable citizen. All the times they had run in vain to catch him; all the times they had had to walk when they might have ridden one behind the other on his back; all his refusals to be tempted; all the wrongs they had endured at his heels boiled in their breasts. They broke their sticks upon his back, they cut new ones, and smashed them too, they hurled the fragments at him, and then got some more. They thrashed, thwacked, banged, thumped, poked, prodded, kicked, belaboured, bumped, and hit him, working themselves into a frenzy of rage. Mark fetched a pole to knock him the harder as it was heavy; Bevis crushed into the hedge, and brought out a dead log to hurl at him, a log he could but just lift and swung to throw with difficulty,--the same Bevis who put an aspen leaf carefully under the fly to save it from drowning. The sky was blue, and the evening beautiful, but no one came to help the donkey.