FullReads

Albert’s uncle said:

“Bed follows supper as the fruit follows the flower. They’ll do no more mischief to-night, sir. To-morrow I will point out a few of the things to be avoided in this bucolic retreat.”

So it was bed directly after supper, and that was why we did not see much that night.

But in the morning we were all up rather early, and we seemed to have awakened in a new world, rich in surprises beyond the dreams of anybody, as it says in the quotation.

We went everywhere we could in the time, but when it was breakfast-time we felt we had not seen half or a quarter. The room we had breakfast in was exactly like in a story–black oak panels and china in corner cupboards with glass doors. These doors were locked. There were green curtains, and honeycomb for breakfast. After brekker my father went back to town, and Albert’s uncle went too, to see publishers. We saw them to the station, and father gave us a long list of what we weren’t to do. It began with “Don’t pull ropes unless you’re quite sure what will happen at the other end,” and it finished with “For goodness’ sake, try to keep out of mischief till I come down on Saturday.” There were lots of other things in between.

We all promised we would. And we saw them off, and waved till the train was quite out of sight. Then we started to walk home. Daisy was tired, so Oswald carried her home on his back. When we got home she said:

“I do like you, Oswald.”

She is not a bad little kid; and Oswald felt it was his duty to be nice to her because she was a visitor. Then we looked all over everything. It was a glorious place. You did not know where to begin.

We were all a little tired before we found the hay-loft, but we pulled ourselves together to make a fort with the trusses of hay–great square things–and we were having a jolly good time, all of us, when suddenly a trap-door opened and a head bobbed up with a straw in its mouth. We knew nothing about the country then, and the head really did scare us rather, though, of course, we found out directly that the feet belonging to it were standing on the bar of the loose-box underneath. The head said:

“Don’t you let the governor catch you a-spoiling of that there hay, that’s all.” And it spoke thickly because of the straw.

It is strange to think how ignorant you were in the past. We can hardly believe now that once we really did not know that it spoiled hay to mess about with it. Horses don’t like to eat it afterwards. Always remember this.

When the head had explained a little more it went away, and we turned the handle of the chaff-cutting machine, and nobody got hurt, though the head had said we should cut our fingers off if we touched it.

And then we sat down on the floor, which is dirty with the nice clean dirt that is more than half chopped hay, and those there was room for hung their legs down out of the top door, and we looked down at the farmyard, which is very slushy when you get down into it, but most interesting.

Then Alice said:

“Now we’re all here, and the boys are tired enough to sit still for a minute, I want to have a council.”

We said, “What about?” And she said, “I’ll tell you. H. O., don’t wriggle so; sit on my frock if the straws tickle your legs.”

You see he wears socks, and so he can never be quite as comfortable as any one else.

“Promise not to laugh,” Alice said, getting very red, and looking at Dora, who got red too.

We did, and then she said: “Dora and I have talked this over, and Daisy too, and we have written it down because it is easier than saying it. Shall I read it? or will you, Dora?”