n the shark bit
Dora.

'I don't know, it's biting me. Oh, it's biting me all over my legs! Oh,
what shall I do? Oh, it does hurt! Oh! oh! oh!' remarked Denny, among
his screams, and he splashed towards the bank. Oswald went into the
water and caught hold of him and helped him out. It is true that Oswald
had his boots on, but I trust he would not have funked the unknown
terrors of the deep, even without his boots, I am almost sure he would
not have.

When Denny had scrambled and been hauled ashore, we saw with horror and
amaze that his legs were stuck all over with large black, slug-looking
things. Denny turned green in the face--and even Oswald felt a bit
queer, for he knew in a moment what the black dreadfulnesses were. He
had read about them in a book called Magnet Stories, where there was a
girl called Theodosia, and she could play brilliant trebles on the piano
in duets, but the other girl knew all about leeches which is much more
useful and golden deedy. Oswald tried to pull the leeches off, but they
wouldn't, and Denny howled so he had to stop trying. He remembered from
the Magnet Stories how to make the leeches begin biting--the girl did it
with cream--but he could not remember how to stop them, and they had not
wanted any showing how to begin.

'Oh, what shall I do? What shall I do? Oh, it does hurt! Oh, oh!' Denny
observed, and Oswald said--

'Be a man! Buck up! If you won't let me take them off you'll just have
to walk home in them.'

At this thought the unfortunate youth's tears fell fast. But Oswald gave
him an arm, and carried his boots for him, and he consented to buck
up, and the two struggled on towards the others, who were coming back,
attracted by Denny's yells. He did not stop howling for a moment, except
to breathe. No one ought to blame him till they have had eleven leeches
on their right leg and six on their left, making seventeen in all, as
Dicky said, at once.

It was lucky he did yell, as it turned out, because a man on the
road--where the telegraph wires were--was interested by his howls, and
came across the marsh to us as hard as he could. When he saw Denny's
legs he said--

'Blest if I didn't think so,' and he picked Denny up and carried him
under one arm, where Denny went on saying 'Oh!' and 'It does hurt' as
hard as ever.

Our rescuer, who proved to be a fine big young man in the bloom of
youth, and a farm-labourer by trade, in corduroys, carried the wretched
sufferer to the cot