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Mary’s Meadow
by
When I said, “Wouldn’t it be a good new game to have an Earthly Paradise in our gardens, and to have a King’s Apothecary and Herbarist to gather things and make medicine of them, and an honest Root-gatherer to divide the polyanthus plants and the bulbs when we take them up, and divide them fairly, and a Weeding Woman to work and make things tidy, and a Queen in a blue dress, and Saxon for the Dwarf”–the others set up such a shout of approbation that Father sent James to inquire if we imagined that he was going to allow his house to be turned into a bear-garden.
And Arther said, “No. Tell him we’re only turning it into a Speaking Garden, and we’re going to turn our own gardens into an Earthly Paradise.”
But I said, “Oh, James! please don’t say anything of the kind. Say we’re very sorry, and we will be quite quiet.”
And James said, “Trust me, Miss. It would be a deal more than my place is worth to carry Master Arthur’s messages to his Pa.”
“I’ll be the honestest Root-gatherer,” said Harry. “I’ll take up Dandelion roots to the very bottom and sell them to the King’s Apothecary to make Dandelion tea of.”
“That’s a good idea of yours, Harry,” said Arthur, “I shall be John Parkinson–“
“My name is Francis le Vean,” said Harry.
“King’s Apothecary and Herbarist,” continued Arthur disdaining the interruption. “And I’ll bet you my Cloth of Gold Pansy to your Black Prince that Bessy’s aunt takes three bottles of my dandelion and chamomile mixture for ‘the swimmings,’ bathes her eyes every morning with my elder flower lotion to strengthen the sight, and sleeps every night on my herb pillow (if Mary’ll make me a flannel bag) before the week’s out.”
“I could make you a flannel bag,” said Adela, “if Mary will make me a bonnet, so that I can be the Weeding Woman. You could make it of tissue paper, with stiff paper inside, like all those caps you made for us last Christmas, Mary, dear, couldn’t you? And there is some lovely orange-colored paper, I know, and pale yellow, and white. The bonnet was Marygold-color, was it not? And one string canary-colored and one white. I couldn’t tie them, of course, being paper; but Bessy’s aunt doesn’t tie her bonnet. She wears it like a helmet, to shade her eyes. I shall wear mine so, too. It will be all Marygold, won’t it dear? Front and crown; and the white string going back over one shoulder, and the canary string over the other. They might be pinned together behind, perhaps, if they were in my way. Don’t you think so?”
I said “Yes,” because if one does not say something, Adela never stops saying whatever it is she is saying, even if she has to say it two or three times over.
But I felt so cross and so selfish, that if Mother could have known she would have despised me!
For the truth was, I had set my heart upon being the Weeding Woman. I thought Adela would want to be the Queen, because of the blue dress, and the plumed hat, and the lace ruffles. Besides, she likes picking flowers, but she never liked grubbing. She would not really like the Weeding Woman’s work; it was the bonnet that had caught her fancy, and I found it hard to smother the vexing thought that if I had gone on dressing the Weeding Woman of the Earthly Paradise like Bessy’s aunt, instead of trying to make the story more interesting by inventing a marygold bonnet with yellow and white strings for her, I might have had the part I wished to play in our new game (which certainly was of my devising), and Adela would have been better pleased to be the Queen than to be anything else.
As it was, I knew that if I asked her she would give up the Weeding Woman. Adela is very good, and she is very good-natured. And I knew, too, that it would not have cost her much. She would have given a sigh about the bonnet, and then have turned her whole attention to a blue robe, and how to manage the ruffles.