Fifth-Form Tactics
It was an unfortunate truth that Miss Gibbs was not very popular at
the Grange. She was clever, conscientious, and well-meaning, and
preserved a high ideal of girlhood. Much too high for practical use,
so her pupils maintained.
"This isn't a school for saints!" grumbled Valentine one day. "If we
followed all Gibbie's pet precepts we should have halos round our
heads."
"And be sprouting wings!" added Raymonde. "A very uncomfortable
process too. I expect it would hurt like cutting teeth, and it would
spoil the fit of one's blouses. I don't want to be an angel! I'm quite
content with this world at present."
"I'm so tired of developing my capabilities!" sighed Fauvette. "One
never gets half an hour now, just to have fun."
Miss Gibbs, who aspired to a partnership in the school, was deeply
concerned this term with the general culture and mental outlook of her
charges. She had attended an educational congress during the Easter
holidays, and came back primed with the very latest theories. She was
determined to work on the most modern methods, and to turn her pupils
out into the world, a little band of ardent thinkers, keen-witted,
self-sacrificing, logical, anxious for the development of their sex,
yearning for careers, in fact the vanguard of a new womanhood.
Unfortunately her material was not altogether promising. A few earnest
spirits, such as Maudie Heywood, responded to her appeals, but the
generality were slow to move. They listened to her impassioned
addresses on women's suffrage without a spark of animation, and sat
stolidly while she descanted upon the bad conditions of labour among
munition girls, and the need for lady welfare workers. The fact was
that her pupils did not care an atom about the position of their sex,
a half-holiday was far more to them than the vote, and their own
grievances loomed larger than those of factory hands. They considered
that they had a very decided grievance at present.
Miss Gibbs, acting on the advice of a book entitled _Education out of
School Hours_, was determined that every moment of the day should be
filled with some occupation that led to culture. She carefully
explained that the word "recreation" meant "re-creation"--a creating
again, not a mere period of frivolity or lotus-eating, and advocated
that all intervals of leisure should be devoted to intellectual
interests. She frowned on girls who sauntered arm-in-arm round the
garden, or sat giggling in the summer-house, and suggested suitable
employments for their idle hands and brains. "Never waste a precious
minute" was her motto, and the girls groaned under it. Healthy hobbies
were all very well, but to be urged to ride them in season and out of
season was distinctly trying. One well-meant effort on Miss Gibbs's
part met with particular disapproval. She had decided to take the
girls on Saturday afternoons to visit various old castles, Roman
camps, and other objects of historical and archaeological interest in
the neighbourhood. On former similar occasions she had been in the
habit of delivering a short lecture when on the spot; but, noticing
that many of the girls were so distracted with gazing at the
surroundings that they were not really listening, she determined that
they should absorb the knowledge before visiting the place. She wrote
careful notes, therefore, upon the subject of their next ramble, and
giving them out in class, ordered each girl to copy them and to commit
them to memory.
The result of her injunction was an outburst of almost mutinous
indignation in Form V.
"When does she expect us to do it, I should like to know?" raged
Morvyth. "There's not a moment to spare in prep., so I suppose it will
have to come out of our so-called recreation! Look here, I call this
the very limit!"
"Saturday afternoon's no holiday when we've got to go prowling round a
wretched Roman camp!" mourned Valentine. "What do I care about ancient
earthworks? If they were modern trenches, now, with soldiers in them,
it would be something like! There'll be nothing to see except some
mounds. I suppose we shall have to stand round and listen while she
holds forth, and look 'intelligent' and 'interested'."
"I don't know whether she's going to hold forth herself," said
Aveline. "I hear she's invited several people from an archaeological
society to meet us there, and probably one of them will do the
spouting--some wheezy old gentleman with a bald head, or an elderly
lady in a waterproof and spectacles. One knows the sort!"
"Oh, good biz!" exclaimed Raymonde. "If visitors are coming, Gibbie'll
have to talk to them, and she won't have so much time to look after
us. She's welcome to the bald old boys! Let her have half a dozen if
she wants!"
"You forget you've got to listen to them."
"Oh, I'll listen! At least I'll look serious and politely absorbed.
That's all that's expected."
"In the meantime we've these wretched notes to copy," groused
Katherine.
"Have we? I don't think so! I've got an idea. Maudie Heywood's sure to
make a most beautiful copperplate copy; we'll borrow hers, and just
skim them over to get a kind of general acquaintance with the subject,
sufficient to show 'intelligent interest'. Gibbie won't be able to
question us with those other people there."
"But suppose she asks beforehand to see our notes?"
"I've thought of that. We'll each copy out the first page, and stick
some old exercise sheets behind it. She'll never find out."
The Mystic Seven looked at their leader in admiration. They considered
that on such occasions her resourcefulness amounted to genius. They
followed her advice, and copied the front page only of the notes,
placing underneath some portions of Latin translation or historical
essay. Aveline underlined her title with red ink, Morvyth ruled a
neat margin, and Fauvette tied her sheets together with a piece of
the blue baby ribbon which she used for threading through her
underclothes. On the outside, at any rate, their copies looked most
presentable.
It was only the Fifth Form who were accorded the privilege of the
ramble. They were Miss Gibbs's special charge this term, Miss Beasley
devoting herself to the Sixth, and Mademoiselle looking after the
Juniors. The Fifth hardly appreciated receiving the lion's share of
Miss Gibbs's attention. They complained that she tried all her
educational experiments upon them. They were ready, however, the whole
ten of them, on Saturday afternoon, clad in the neat school uniform,
brown serge skirt, khaki blouse, scarlet tie, and burnt-straw hat.
Miss Gibbs viewed them with approval. Each had slung over her
shoulders a vasculum for botanical or other specimens, and each
carried in her hand a copy of the notes. They looked business-like,
healthy, well trained, and alert with intelligence, altogether an
excellent advertisement for the school and its modern methods.
The camp was about a two-mile walk from the Grange, so the Form had at
least the satisfaction of obtaining exercise. As Valentine had
prophesied, it consisted of some mounds in the middle of a field,
where, to Fauvette's infinite discomposure, some cows were grazing.
The members of the Archaeological Society had already arrived, and came
forward to greet Miss Gibbs. There was a large stout gentleman, with a
grey moustache and bushy overhanging eyebrows; also a little thin
gentleman with a pointed beard and an argumentative voice; a tall
lady with a high colour, who carried a guide-book, and a short-sighted
younger man, who was trying to spread out an ordnance map. These
seemed to be the principal members of the party, though there were a
few stragglers.
"Professor Edwards--my girls!" said Miss Gibbs, introducing the Form
_en bloc_ to the leader for the afternoon.
The stout gentleman smiled blandly, and murmured some suitable remark
about the value of acquiring antiquarian tastes while still young.
"I had perhaps better read my short paper before we inspect the
remains," he added.
"Goody! He surely isn't going to disinter any dead Romans to show us,
is he?" whispered Katherine.
"Bunkum!" replied Ardiune. "Nothing as thrilling as that, don't you
fear!"
Miss Gibbs smiled encouragingly to the Form, and beckoned them to draw
nearer. They arranged themselves in a respectful semicircle, with
attentive eyes fixed on the lecturer, and copies of notes rather
conspicuously flaunted.
He discoursed exhaustively on the subject of Roman camps in general,
and the girls listened with receptive faces, but minds wandering upon
more modern themes. Morvyth was speculating whether it would be
possible to purchase chocolates on the way home, Fauvette was planning
her next party frock, and Aveline was wondering whether there would be
jam or honey for tea that day.
"Before I ask you to take a personal survey of the earthworks,"
concluded the Professor, "I should like to have Miss Gibbs's opinion
as to the exact position of the entrance and the approximate date of
construction. She has, I know, made a study of this branch of
archaeology."
"My ideas are embodied in my notes," purred Miss Gibbs. "Perhaps you
would not mind reading the paragraph. I lent them a short time ago to
Mrs. Gladwin."
Professor Edwards turned expectantly; but the tall lady, who a moment
before had been at his elbow, had strayed away, papers in hand, and
was not available for reference.
"My girls all have copies of the notes. Pass yours, Ardiune," smiled
the mistress.
The luckless Ardiune blushed scarlet, but dared not disobey.
"The passage occurs about the middle," prompted Miss Gibbs, as the
Professor fumbled with the pages. "May I find it for you? Why, surely
there must be some mistake! This is French! Valentine, your copy,
child!"
With an even more crimson countenance Valentine tendered her
manuscript, which consisted of last week's essay on Comets. Miss
Gibbs, with a growing tightness round her lips, inspected Raymonde's
extracts from Chaucer, and Katherine's translation of Virgil, before
Aveline had the presence of mind to hand up Maudie Heywood's copy. It
is unwise for a mistress to show temper before visitors, and Miss
Gibbs, with admirable self-control, mastered her feelings and read the
paragraph calmly. During the discussion which followed, the girls
availed themselves of an invitation from the short-sighted gentleman
to inspect the earthworks, and thankfully fled to the farthest limits
of the field. They knew, of course, that it was only putting off the
evil hour, and further events justified their forebodings. Miss Gibbs
preserved an ominous silence on the way home, and after tea summoned
the Form to their class-room, where she went into exhaustive details
of the whole business.
"I'm disgusted with you--utterly disgusted!" she declared. "It seems
of little use to spend time in attempting to give you intellectual
interests. Those girls who did not copy the notes will stay in now and
write them. I shall look at them all at eight o'clock."
"It means a good solid hour's work," whispered Raymonde to Ardiune.
"Tennis is off to-night. Strafe the old camp! I wish the Romans had
never lived!"