Florence Wilford

“ These fishings with Percy became a sort of institution during that week, which Jessie had rather counted on for having Cecil all to herself. 'Francie doesn't care, because she wants to do her gardening; but what made me like so to have holidays, was only that I might go about with Cecil, and now he goes off with Percy and doesn't want me!' thought the poor little maiden, in rather an injured way, as she sat forlornly in the wide window-seat on Wednesday morning, watching the retreating figures of her brothers. ”

“ Yorke rose up.
'Not to church now, but I must be off to Bar-end, where I have my class of hobbledehoys from the farms.'
'Do you think father will expect me at the catechizing?'
'I should think he would be glad to see you there.'
'I mustn't stand with the choir, I suppose,' said Cecil, hesitating.
'No; but I think, if I were you, I should be all the more anxious to go. You're not sulking, I can see, Cecil; so why should you let any one think you are?'
'I have been, though,' said Cecil rather awkwardly, breaking through his shyness now that truth seemed to require it. ”

“ But, Johnnie, you don't know how hard it makes it for me to submit to be ill and helpless, when I think that because I am not able to watch over you, you are running wild, neglecting your lessons, and vexing poor papa, who has so much to trouble him.'
Jean-sans-terre's brown eyes looked odd in their expression of mingled fun and sadness; he was trying to feel sorry and ashamed, as he knew he ought, but penitence was so very difficult to him. 'Dear little mother, don't fret; I'll do better for the future,' he said caressingly. ”

“ Jessie could hardly bring herself to believe that he could have deserved it in any way, but his submission was much less grievous and perplexing to her than his rebellion had been; and she received these few words—spoken rather gruffly, with his back turned to her—as a great proof of confidence, which indeed they were.
'If being very good makes people ready to be clergymen, I'm sure Cecil's getting ready as fast as he can,' she remarked to Frances. ”

“ There is no praise like the praise of a soul that can say with holy Job, "Though He slay me, yet will I trust in Him;" or with Habakkuk, "Although the fig-tree shall not blossom, neither shall fruit be in the vines; the labour of the olive shall fail, and the fields shall yield no meat; the flock [104] shall be cut off from the fold, and there shall be no herd in the stalls: yet I will rejoice in the Lord, I will joy in the God of my salvation."'
'If I had sung in the choir to-day, it wouldn't have been real praise; I shouldn't have thought of it or meant it,' Cecil owned to himself ”

“ I don't believe we could dig it up properly, for there are none of us strong enough for the work but myself and you, Johnnie; and you're such an idle fellow, you wouldn't work for more than ten minutes together.'
'Oh yes, he will, if it's for mamma,' cried Willie; 'and papa would be so pleased. Do let's begin, Honorius; I can dig quite well, and the little ones might pull up some of the weeds.'
'We must mark the paths first if we're to do it at all,' said Honorius in his deliberate way. ”

“ Mrs. Campbell's surprise and delight were great enough to satisfy her sons, which is saying a good deal. She would not sit down till she had made the tour of the garden (it would be an insult to say 'desert' any longer) ; and she accepted a sprig of Johnnie's geranium, and a handful of Duncan's sweet-peas; tasted one of Archie's nasturtium flowers when assured by him that it was 'so nice;' was duly edified by the sight of the remains of the tooth-brush, worn to a stump by Georgie's sedulous and novel use of it ”

“ I'm going to old Bardsley's day school in Fairview, and there's nothing to be got there.'
'Still I wouldn't give up if I were you, my boy; I would keep the hope before me. There's nothing like a high aim to help one through the drudgery of school-work, and keep one out of stupid, little, mean temptations.'
'I know, and it was for that I worked,' said Cecil, 'at least for that chiefly; but it was all no use, and it doesn't seem worth while to try any more.'
Mr. Yorke, who had supposed that Cecil hadn't worked, did not quite know what answer to make to this. ”

“ He had been himself surprised, in the first instance, at the result of his addition; but as he had only to do with Cecil in mathematics, in which he was not remarkably proficient, it did not seem so astonishing to him as it did to his father, who had watched the boy's progress in classics. Dr. Lomax had not gone over the books himself at the time, but having occasion to refer to them for something the morning of the day on which Mr. Lomax wrote, he had counted up Cecil's marks throughout the year, just for his own satisfaction, and in doing so had discovered the mistake that had been made. ”

“ Cunningham, smiling; 'you have plenty, I know, and the great use of it is to help us to see things from other people's point of view. Shall I tell you something else? I am so glad of this companionship because I believe Cecil, though the younger, will do Percy good.'
Jessie quite understood this; her face brightened, as it always did at anything like praise of Cecil, and she felt it very delightful to be taken into her father's confidence in such a 'grown-up' kind of way. ”

“ Johnnie still remained 'sans terre,' by his own desire, but worked away in his father's garden as he never had done in the part that was called his own. He began to get on better at school too; and Willie joined him there after the summer vacation, and helped to keep him steady by his example and admonitions. For Willie had certainly a little taste for lecturing; and Lackland, the harum-scarum and good-humoured, was just the boy both to provoke it and to bear it: if he was a [71] Du Guesclin in bravery, he was not in quarrelsomeness, and nothing that Willie could say ever made him angry. ”

“ She was quite relieved, however, by Cecil's eager negative, and went off to her kitchen well satisfied; while Mr. Yorke, after saying grace, proceeded to do the honours of the repast.
'May I give you some pickles, Cecil?' he said mischievously. 'I don't see anything to eat with them, so I suppose they are meant to form a course by themselves.' [111]
'They wouldn't be bad with bread and cheese,' rejoined Cecil, laughing; 'some of our seniors eat them with all sorts of things.'
'Well, you can try the combination if you like, but I don't see any cheese; and oh, hulloa! there's no bread either. ”

“ Yorke could only guess what 'this' was, and did not seek to have it explained, not wishing to make himself a judge of anything that lay between Cecil and his father.
'You mean, why is disgrace allowed to come upon a person which they cannot feel they have deserved? I don't think we can always tell why—I think we must be content to trust and submit; but it may often be to teach them some lesson which they could not have learned without it. ”

“ Yorke's chair.
'Is there anything more you require, sir?' said the old dame before withdrawing, in a complacent tone that seemed to say, What could they require when such a variety was before them?
'Thank you, let me see: would you like some mutton, Cecil?'
Mrs. Keeling almost frowned at this proposal. How could the good young gentleman be so inconsiderate, she thought, as to propose to his visitor for lunch what was by and by to come up for dinner? ”

“ But he could almost have thought that she guessed at his scheme when she went on, 'If you would only pursue one thing steadily, and make yourself do it in spite of disinclination, you don't know what good it would do you, and how it would help you in everything else. Be a hero, Johnnie, and conquer your idleness!'
'I mean to be a real hero some day, mamma,' he answered, smiling. ”

“ Of all things, Honorius could not bear that his father should reproach himself. 'I'm sure Johnnie admits that he was in fault about Bob, papa,' he said.
'And do you know I've got a bright idea about Bob and the thermometer, papa,' said Willie. 'May I go as far as Farmer Merryman's field and back? I won't be long.'
'Certainly you may, if it's necessary for the development of your bright idea, Willie; but make haste home to tea. And you, boys, come in with me; if you're not hungry, I am.'
In the strength of his bright idea Willie ran along like a greyhound ”

“ He did not dislike either the school or the schoolmaster as much as he had expected; and he felt that if he worked hard, and conformed to rules, there was no danger of his ever finding Mr. Bardsley the terrible monster that Jim Payne had described him to be.
It would, and did, seem a drudgery to prepare school tasks that evening, while Percy was enjoying 'elegant leisure;' but there was [130] the Saturday half-holiday to look forward to, and Cecil's health was good, and not likely to suffer from his speedy return to work. ”

“ Jessie went into a little tool-shed, which [85] was close to the rabbits' dwelling-place. She did not like to watch the window, but was too anxious to be able to go and help Francie with her gardening, or to play with Lewis, who was wandering aimlessly about. 'Father,' who was so tender to his little girls, who was the very very best man, as Jessie believed, in the whole world, could nevertheless be very severe when he saw occasion—could reprove in a way which an offender was not likely to forget. ”

“ He thinks it nonsense, because he doesn't know how hard we mean to work, and how steadily we'll keep on at it. It'll be such fun when he sees we can do a great deal more than he thinks!'
Honorius allowed himself to be convinced by this reasoning, and went with Willie and Seymour to the desert to work away till it got near three o'clock, at which time he had to return to school. Johnnie worked steadily at Cæsar till he heard his father go out, and then went up-stairs softly and tapped at his mother's door. ”

“ He's a clever man, I think, and has a real taste for teaching. When he gets hold of a fellow that cares to learn, I'm told there's no limit to the pains he'll take with him.'
'Jim Payne didn't like him at all,' said Cecil, alluding to the son of a small farmer in the neighbourhood; 'he said he was an awful brute.' [129]
'Jim Payne likes nothing but idleness, and his father is mistaken enough to let him have his way.'
Cecil wisely suppressed some further quotations which he had meant to make from Jim Payne's account of Mr. Bardsley ”

“ Dr. Campbell had no objection; so Honorius ran into the house to fetch the jacket, observing, 'I shall tell him to take himself off when I've given it him; it's not manners to stare over at us in this way.' When he returned, however, from his colloquy with the grinning Bob, he explained, 'He doesn't mean to be rude, he says, but he's so pleased that we've made the desert so trim, and that "madam," as he calls mamma, is able to come [67] out and see it. He's immensely pleased with the jacket, but he doesn't want to go away till he's spoken to Johnnie and Willie.'
Willie ran off at once. ”

“ Cunningham had set before his people as the thing to be longed and striven for. Entering fully! Ah, with most of us it takes a lifetime to do that; but none of us are too young to begin to learn it.
Cecil went back to his old position by the churchyard palings after service to wait for Mr. Yorke, but could not quite escape some greetings from his village friends, who were 'glad to see him back, and hoped he had his health.' He looked up anxiously when he saw his father and the curate come forth [105] from the vestry together ”

“ I'll work night and day sooner than not pass, for I must be an officer. You know, mamma, we've settled it all. Honorius is to be a doctor, like papa, and I'm to be a soldier, and Willie is to be a clergyman, and Duncan a sailor, and Seymour a merchant, and Archie a lawyer, and Georgie—somehow we never can settle what Georgie is to be—but something, of course, you know ”

“ This reminded Cecil of his father's sermon, which indeed Mr. Yorke had in his mind when [115] he spoke. He was silent a good while, then he began on what seemed at first another subject. 'If something that wasn't your own fault had come to hinder you when you were being educated for a clergyman, shouldn't you have thought you weren't meant to be one?'
'I think it would have depended on what the hindrance was, and a good many other circumstances. It isn't only book-learning that makes people fit to be clergymen ”

“ Yorke was come to take him back; but he was soon undeceived.
'I've got business in Fairview,' the young clergyman explained, 'and I meant to go in early; and when I saw you pass by, I thought I might as well get ready and try to overtake you. I like company myself; don't you?'
'Yes, very much,' said Cecil, swinging his books over his shoulder cheerfully again, instead of dangling them drearily from the end [127] of the strap, as he had been doing before. 'Lewis wanted to come with me, but mother wouldn't have liked his walking back alone ”

“ What do you say to it, my Emperor? is not your royal mind duly horrified?' The Emperor, as his brother called him, in allusion to his imperial namesake, by no means showed the disgust expected of him: he turned up a bit of the soil with his pocket-knife, and said reflectively,
'I should think it would grow potatoes very well, but it'll want a deal in the way of preparation. ”

“ Johnnie alone was silent; but his dimples were all in play, and he had never looked more roguish.
'Sans-terre means to steal a march on us, [64] and do more than any of us, I do believe, though he won't make promises,' said Honorius.
'Sans-terre shall be sans-terre no longer,' said Dr. Campbell; 'he has earned back a right to his own plot of flower-garden, and may enter into possession again to-night, if he pleases.'
But Lackland shrugged his shoulders, and declined the burden of proprietorship.
'I don't care to have any garden of my own, thank you, papa,' he answered ”