When we were sent down into the country to learn to be good we felt it
was rather good business, because we knew our being sent there was
really only to get us out of the way for a little while, and we knew
right enough that it wasn't a punishment, though Mrs. Blake said it was,
because we had been punished thoroughly for taking the stuffed animals
out and making a jungle on the lawn with them, and the garden hose. And
you cannot be punished twice for the same offence. This is the English
law; at least I think so. And at any rate no one would punish you three
times, and we had had the Malacca cane and the solitary confinement; and
the uncle had kindly explained to us that all ill-feeling between him
and us was wiped out entirely by the bread and water we had endured. And
what with the bread and water and being prisoners, and not being able to
tame any mice in our prisons, I quite feel that we had suffered it up
thoroughly, and now we could start fair.
I think myself that descriptions of places are generally dull, but I
have sometimes thought that was because the authors do not tell you what
you truly want to know. However, dull or not, here goes--because you
won't understand anything unless I tell you what the place was like.
The Moat House was the one we went to stay at. There has been a house
there since Saxon times. It is a manor, and a manor goes on having a
house on it whatever happens. The Moat House was burned down once or
twice in ancient centuries--I don't remember which--but they always
built a new one, and Cromwell's soldiers smashed it about, but it was
patched up again. It is a very odd house: the front door opens straight
into the dining-room, and there are red curtains and a black-and-white
marble floor like a chess-board, and there is a secret staircase, only
it is not secret now--only rather rickety. It is not very big, but there
is a watery moat all round it with a brick bridge that leads to the
front door. Then, on the other side of the moat there is the farm, with
barns and oast-houses and stables, or things like that. And the other
way the garden lawn goes on till it comes to the church-yard. The
church-yard is not divided from the garden at all except by a little
grass bank. In the front of the house there is more garden, and the big
fruit-garden is at the back.
The man the house belongs to likes new houses, so he built a big one
with conservatories and a stable with a clock in a turret on the top,
and he let the Moat House. And Albert's uncle took it, and my father was
to come down sometimes from Saturday to Monday, and Albert's uncle was
to live with us all the time, and he would be writing a book, and we
were not to bother him, but he would give an eye to us. I hope all this
is plain. I have said it as short as I can.
We got down rather late, but there was still light enough to see the big
bell hanging at the top of the house. The rope belonging to it went
right down the house, through our bedroom to the dining-room. H. O. saw
the rope and pulled it while he was washing his hands for supper, and
Dick and I let him, and the bell tolled solemnly. Father shouted to him
not to, and we went down to supper. But presently there were many feet
trampling on the gravel, and father went out to see. When he came back
he said:
"The whole village, or half of it, has come up to see why the bell rang.
It's only rung for fire or burglars. Why can't you kids let things
alone?"
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?"
Dora said it didn't matter; Alice might. So Alice read it, and though
she gabbled a bit we all heard it. I copied it afterwards. This is what
she read:
"NEW SOCIETY FOR BEING GOOD IN
"I, Dora Bastable, and Alice Bastable, my sister, being of sound mind
and body, when we were shut up with bread and water on that jungle day,
we thought a great deal about our naughty sins, and we made our minds up
to be good forever after. And we talked to Daisy about it, and she had
an idea. So we want to start a society for being good in. It is Daisy's
idea, but we think so too."
"You know," Dora interrupted, "when people want to do good things they
always make a society. There are thousands--there's the Missionary
Society."
"Yes," Alice said, "and the Society for the Prevention of something or
other, and the Young Men's Mutual Improvement Society, and the S. P. G."
"What's S. P. G.?" Oswald asked.
"Society for the Propagation of the Jews, of course," said Noel, who
cannot always spell.
"No, it isn't; but do let me go on."
Alice did go on.
"We propose to get up a society, with a chairman and a treasurer and
secretary, and keep a journal-book saying what we've done. If that
doesn't make us good it won't be my fault.
"The aim of the society is nobleness and goodness, and great and
unselfish deeds. We wish not to be such a nuisance to grown-up people,
and to perform prodigies of real goodness. We wish to spread our
wings"--here Alice read very fast. She told me afterwards Daisy had
helped her with that part, and she thought when she came to the wings
they sounded rather silly--"to spread our wings and rise above the kind
of interesting things that you ought not to do, but to do kindnesses to
all, however low and mean."
Denny was listening carefully. Now he nodded three or four times.
"Little words of kindness" (he said),
"Little deeds of love,
Make this earth an eagle
Like the one above."
This did not sound right, but we let it pass, because an eagle _does_
have wings, and we wanted to hear the rest of what the girls had
written. But there was no rest.
"That's all," said Alice, and Daisy said:
"Don't you think it's a good idea?"
"That depends," Oswald answered, "who is president, and what you mean by
being good." Oswald did not care very much for the idea himself,
because being good is not the sort of thing he thinks it is proper to
talk about, especially before strangers. But the girls and Denny seemed
to like it, so Oswald did not say exactly what he thought, especially as
it was Daisy's idea. This was true politeness.
"I think it would be nice," Noel said, "if we made it a sort of play.
Let's do the 'Pilgrim's Progress.'"
We talked about that for some time, but it did not come to anything,
because we all wanted to be Mr. Greatheart, except H. O., who wanted to
be the lions, and you could not have lions in a Society for Goodness.
Dicky said he did not wish to play if it meant reading books about
children who die; he really felt just as Oswald did about it, he told me
afterwards. But the girls were looking as if they were in Sunday school,
and we did not wish to be unkind.
At last Oswald said, "Well, let's draw up the rules of the society, and
choose the president and settle the name."
Dora said Oswald should be president, and he modestly consented. She was
secretary, and Denny treasurer if we ever had any money.
Making the rules took us all the afternoon. They were these: