garden is at its best, and the fruit trees, planted by those who taught at Fairacre long ago, are a mass of pink and white blossom. Mr Willet and all the other good gardeners pull long faces and say: 'Don't like to see it so early. Bound to get some late frosts, mark my words.'
A blackbird has built a nest in the lilac bush near the gate—so idiotically low that Tibby is much interested and spends her time glowering upon the foolish bird, from the top of the gate. I have tried to screen it with hazel boughs, but with small success. At my suggestion, to Mr Willet, that I might drape it with netting from the fruit cage, he looked at me pityingly, blew out his ragged old moustache, and said: 'Why not let the poor cat have a good meal? He's waited patient enough, ain't he?'
Mrs Pringle came to give me a hand with some spring-cleaning during the holidays, which she did with much puffing and blowing. To hear her disparaging comments on the condition of the backs of the bookcases, and the loot that she extracted from the sides of the arm-chairs, one might wonder why I hadn't died of typhus.
'Mrs Hope, what lived here in my young days, though an ailing woman with a child, and a husband with a Fading,' she told me, as she hauled out the loose cover from the crack of the sofa, 'never had so much as a biscuit crumb in her folds, they being brushed out regular twice a week, as is necessary for common cleanliness.' To add point to this stricture, she jerked out the last bit of the cover and projected a light shower of crumbs—biscuit and otherwise—two pencils, a safety-pin, a knitting needle and a liquorice allsort, upon the carpet. I was unrepentant.
Term is now a week old. The children look all the better for their freedom and fresh air, and it is very pleasant to have Miss Clare back again in the infants' room, where she reigned for so many years. However it is not without certain small difficulties. The children are used to Mrs Annett's more modern methods, and have been allowed to move about the classroom, to talk a little and to make much more noise than Miss Clare will allow. They are finding Miss Clare's more formal methods rather irksome.
'Can we play shops?' I heard Joseph Coggs ask, as I was collecting Miss Clare's savings money. 'Mrs Annett lets us play shops instead of writing down sums.' His dark eyes were fixed pleadingly upon her.
'I think we'd have table practice first,' was the kind, but firm, answer; and Joseph trailed back to his desk, with a pouting underlip.
'Do use all the apparatus that is here,' I said, waving to the desk-load of sugar cartons, cocoa tins and the like, that constitute 'the shop' at the side of the room, 'and don't worry about the noise—my children don't take any notice of a little hum next door.' But my gentle hints were of no avail. I could see from Miss Clare's quizzical glance that she knew exactly what was going on inside my head, and knew too that she was too old a dog to learn new tricks—even if she felt that they were the right ones, which, in this case, she doubts.
In a week or two the children will have become accustomed to a slower and steadier regime, and will respond to Miss Clare's methods as wed as earlier generations of Fairacre children have done. Meanwhile, I have offered to take her class, as well as my own, for the games and physical training lessons, for not only is this too much of a strain on her elderly and delicate heart, but the small children revel in scampering and jumping and using the wealth of individual apparatus—balls, hoops, skipping ropes and the like—which they miss sorely in the formal four lines for head, arm, leg and trunk exercises which are used for the major part of Miss Clare's lessons.
It has not been easy to persuade Miss Clare to part with any of her duties, for she is the most conscientious woman alive; but after some demurring she acquiesced, not only in this matter but also in my suggestion that she rested for twenty minutes on my
A blackbird has built a nest in the lilac bush near the gate—so idiotically low that Tibby is much interested and spends her time glowering upon the foolish bird, from the top of the gate. I have tried to screen it with hazel boughs, but with small success. At my suggestion, to Mr Willet, that I might drape it with netting from the fruit cage, he looked at me pityingly, blew out his ragged old moustache, and said: 'Why not let the poor cat have a good meal? He's waited patient enough, ain't he?'
Mrs Pringle came to give me a hand with some spring-cleaning during the holidays, which she did with much puffing and blowing. To hear her disparaging comments on the condition of the backs of the bookcases, and the loot that she extracted from the sides of the arm-chairs, one might wonder why I hadn't died of typhus.
'Mrs Hope, what lived here in my young days, though an ailing woman with a child, and a husband with a Fading,' she told me, as she hauled out the loose cover from the crack of the sofa, 'never had so much as a biscuit crumb in her folds, they being brushed out regular twice a week, as is necessary for common cleanliness.' To add point to this stricture, she jerked out the last bit of the cover and projected a light shower of crumbs—biscuit and otherwise—two pencils, a safety-pin, a knitting needle and a liquorice allsort, upon the carpet. I was unrepentant.
Term is now a week old. The children look all the better for their freedom and fresh air, and it is very pleasant to have Miss Clare back again in the infants' room, where she reigned for so many years. However it is not without certain small difficulties. The children are used to Mrs Annett's more modern methods, and have been allowed to move about the classroom, to talk a little and to make much more noise than Miss Clare will allow. They are finding Miss Clare's more formal methods rather irksome.
'Can we play shops?' I heard Joseph Coggs ask, as I was collecting Miss Clare's savings money. 'Mrs Annett lets us play shops instead of writing down sums.' His dark eyes were fixed pleadingly upon her.
'I think we'd have table practice first,' was the kind, but firm, answer; and Joseph trailed back to his desk, with a pouting underlip.
'Do use all the apparatus that is here,' I said, waving to the desk-load of sugar cartons, cocoa tins and the like, that constitute 'the shop' at the side of the room, 'and don't worry about the noise—my children don't take any notice of a little hum next door.' But my gentle hints were of no avail. I could see from Miss Clare's quizzical glance that she knew exactly what was going on inside my head, and knew too that she was too old a dog to learn new tricks—even if she felt that they were the right ones, which, in this case, she doubts.
In a week or two the children will have become accustomed to a slower and steadier regime, and will respond to Miss Clare's methods as wed as earlier generations of Fairacre children have done. Meanwhile, I have offered to take her class, as well as my own, for the games and physical training lessons, for not only is this too much of a strain on her elderly and delicate heart, but the small children revel in scampering and jumping and using the wealth of individual apparatus—balls, hoops, skipping ropes and the like—which they miss sorely in the formal four lines for head, arm, leg and trunk exercises which are used for the major part of Miss Clare's lessons.
It has not been easy to persuade Miss Clare to part with any of her duties, for she is the most conscientious woman alive; but after some demurring she acquiesced, not only in this matter but also in my suggestion that she rested for twenty minutes on my
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