"I hope you have had fun enough to pay for waking me up out of the queerest dream any body ever had," he said. And he told all about the barber, and the epaulets that became roosters, and the red-hot sword for a razor, etc. Then, looking at himself again in the piece of glass, he called out, "Give me those shears;" and taking them, he manfully cut off his mutilated curls. "There, that isn't exactly the fighting-cut, Jack, but 'twill do. Now, boys, tell some more of those dull stories, and I guess I can go to sleep again." And he lay down once more, declining to accept an urgent invitation to preach. "There, boys," said stout Abram Atwater, who had sat all the time cross-legged, a silent, gravely-smiling spectator of the scene, "you shan't fool him any more. He has got pluck; he has shown it. And now let him alone." IV. THE OLD DRUMMER AND THE NEW DRUM. As yet, Frank had no drum. Neither had he any scientific knowledge of the instrument. He was ambitious of entering upon his novel occupation, and was elated to learn, the next morning, that he was to begin his acquaintance with the noble art of drumming that very day. "The sergeant is inquiring for you," said Abram Atwater, with his mild, pleasant smile, calling him out of the tent. Frank, who was writing a letter to his mother, on his knapsack, jumped up with alacrity, hid his paper, and ran out to see what was wanted. "This way, Manly," said the sergeant. "Here's the man that's to give you lessons. Go with him." The teacher was a veteran drummer, with a twinkling gray eye, a long, thick, gray mustache, and a rather cynical way of showing his teeth under it. He had some drumsticks thrust into his pocket, but no drum. "I suppose," thought Frank, "we shall find our drums in the woods;" into which his instructor straightway conducted him in order to be away from the diversions and noises of the camp. Frank was disappointed. The veteran gave him his first exercise--on a board! "I thought I was to learn on a drum," he ventured to suggest, looking up, not without awe, at the bushy mustache. "You don't want a drum till you know how to drum," said the veteran. "But I should think it would be better----" "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.