I don't want my lad to grow up with a pair of bow legs like a groom, and probably something worse, from living on horseback before his bones are set.

You see I have a good reason for what I do." But I think that the lessons Sam liked best of all were the swimming lessons, and at a very early age he could swim and dive like a black, and once when disporting himself in the water, when not more than thirteen, poor Sam nearly had a stop put to his bathing for ever, and that in a very frightful manner.
His father and he had gone down to bathe one hot noon; the Major had swum out and was standing on the rock wiping himself while Sam was still disporting in the mid-river; as he watched the boy he saw what seemed a stick upon the water, and then, as he perceived the ripple around it, the horrible truth burst on the affrighted father: it was a large black snake crossing the river, and poor little Sam was swimming straight towards it, all unconscious of his danger.
The Major cried out and waved his hand; the boy, seeing something was wrong, turned and made for the shore, and the next moment his father, bending his body back, hurled himself through the air and alighted in the water alongside of him, clutching him round the body, and heading down the river with furious strokes.
"Don't cling, Sam, or get frightened; make for the shore." The lad, although terribly frightened at he knew not what, with infinite courage seconded his father's efforts although he felt sinking.

In a few minutes they were safe on the bank, in time for them to see the reptile land, and crawling up the bank disappear among the rocks.
"God has been very good to us, my son.

You have been saved from a terrible death.

Mind you don't breathe a word to your mother about this." That night Sam dreamt that he was in the coils of a snake, but waking up found that his father was laid beside him in his clothes with one arm round his neck, so he went to sleep again and thought no more of the snake.
"My son, if sinners entice thee, consent thou not"-- a saying which it is just possible you have heard before.