[Illustration: "Two funny fair-haired children with their fingers in
their mouths"]
MILLY AND OLLY
New Revised Edition
BY
MRS. HUMPHRY WARD
Illustrated by RUTH M. HALLOCK
GARDEN CITY NEW YORK
DOUBLEDAY, PAGE & COMPANY
1914
DEDICATION
TO F.A., IN THE NAME OF THE CHILDREN OF FOX HOW, THIS REVIVAL OF A
CHILD'S STORY WRITTEN TWENTY-SEVEN YEARS AGO, UNDER THE SPELL OF ROTHA
AND FAIRFIELD, IS INSCRIBED BY THE WRITER.
PREFACE
After many years this little book is once more to see the light. The
children for whom it was written are long since grown up. But perhaps
the pleasure they once took in it may still be felt by some of the
Millys and Ollys of to-day. Up in the dear mountain country which it
describes, the becks are still sparkling; "Brownholme" still spreads its
green steeps and ferny hollows under rain and sun; the tiny trout still
leap in its tiny streams; and Fairfield, in its noble curve, still
girdles the deep valley where these children played: the valley of
Wordsworth and Arnold--the valley where Arnold's poet-son rambled as a
boy--where, for me, the shy and passionate ghost of Charlotte Brontë
still haunts the open door-way of Fox How--where poetry and generous
life and ranging thought still dwell, and bring their benediction to the
passers-by. "Aunt Emma" in her beautiful home, unchanged but for its
vacant chairs, is now as she ever was, the friend of old and young; and
the children of to-day still press to her side as their elders did
before them. The parrot alas! is gone where parrots may; but amid the
voices that breathe around Fox How--the voices of seventy years--his
mimic speech is still remembered by the children who teased and loved
him. For love, while love lasts, gives life to all things small and
great; and in those who have once felt it, the love of the Fairfield
valley, of the gray stone house that fronts the fells, and of them that
dwell therein, is "not Time's fool--"
"Or bends with the remover to remove."
MARY A. WARD.
September 18, 1907.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER
I. Making Plans
II. A Journey North
III. Ravensnest
IV. Out on the Hills
V. Aunt Emma's Picnic
VI. Wet Days at Ravensnest
VII. A Story-telling Game
VIII. The Story of Beowulf
IX. Milly's Birthday
X. Last Days at Ravensnest
ILLUSTRATIONS
"Two funny fair-haired children with their fingers in their mouths"
"'I can't do without my toys, Nana'"
"The flowers Milly gathered for her mother"
"So they put Olly up on a tall piece of rock, and he sang"
"He was quite sure that h-a-y spelt 'ham' and s-a-w spelt 'was'"
"'Suppose we have a story-telling game'"
"Haymaking"
"'Haven't you got a bump?' asked Olly"
CHAPTER I
MAKING PLANS
"Milly, come down! come down directly! Mother wants you. Do make haste!"
"I'm just coming, Olly. Don't stamp so. Nurse is tying my sash."
But Master Olly went on stamping, and jumping up and down stairs, as his
way was when he was very much excited, till Milly appeared. Presently
down she came, a sober fair-haired little maiden, with blue eyes and a
turn-up nose, and a mouth that was generally rather solemn-looking,
though it could laugh merrily enough when it tried. Milly was six years
old. She looked older than six. At any rate she looked a great deal
older than Olly, who was nearly five; and you will soon find out that
she was a good deal more than a year and a half wiser.
"What's the matter, Olly? What made you shout so?"
"Oh, come along, come along;" said the little boy, pulling at his
sister's hand to make her run. "Mother wants to tell us something, and
she says it's a nice something, and I kissed her like anyfing! but she
wouldn't tell me without you."
Then the two children set off running, and they flew down a long passage
to the drawing-room, and were soon scrambling about a lady who was
sitting working by the window.
"Well, monkeys, don't choke me before I tell you my nice something. Sit
on my knee Olly. Now, Milly, guess--what have father and I just been
talking about?"
"Sending Olly to school, perhaps," said Milly. "I heard Uncle Richard
talking about it yesterday."
"That wouldn't be such a nice something," said Olly, making a long face.
"I wouldn't like it--not a bit. Boys don't never like going to school. I
want to learn my lessons with mother."
"I know a little boy that doesn't like learning lessons with mother very
much," said the lady, laughing. "But my nice something isn't sending
Olly to school, Milly. You're quite wrong--so try again."
"Oh, mother! is it a strawberry tea?" cried Milly. "The strawberries are
just ripe, I know. Gardener told nurse so this morning. And we can have
tea on the lawn, and ask Jacky and Francis!"
"Oh, jolly!" said Oliver, jumping off his mother's knee and beginning to
dance about. "And we'll gather them ourselves--won't you let us,
mother?"
"But it isn't a strawberry tea even," said his mother. "Now, look here,
children, what have I got here?"
"It's a map--a map of England," said Milly, looking very wise. Milly had
just begun to learn geography, and thought she knew all about maps.
"Well, and what happens when father and I look at maps in the
summertime?"
"Why," said Milly, slowly, "you and father pack up your things, and go
away over the sea, and we stay behind with nurse."
"I don't call _that_ a nice something," said Olly, standing still again.
"Oh, mother, _are_ you going away?" said Milly, hanging round her
mother's neck.
"Yes, Milly, and so's father, and so's nurse"--and their mother began to
laugh.
"So's nurse?" said Milly and Olly together, and then they stopped and
opened two pairs of round eyes very wide, and stared at their mother.
"Oh, mother, mother, take us too!"
"Why, how should father and I get on, travelling about with a pair of
monkeys?" said their mother, catching hold of the two children and
lifting them on to her knee; "we should want a cage to keep them in."
"Oh, mother, we'll be _ever_ so good! But where are we going? Oh, do
take us to the sea!"
"Yes, the sea! the sea!" shouted Olly, careering round the room again;
"we'll have buckets and spades, and we'll paddle and catch crabbies, and
wet our clothes, and have funny shoes, just like Cromer. And father'll
teach me to swim--he said he would next time."
"No," said Mrs. Norton, for that was the name of Milly's and Oliver's
mother. "No, we are not going to the sea this summer. We are going to a
place mother loves better than the sea, though perhaps you children
mayn't like it quite so well. We're going to the mountains. Uncle
Richard has lent father and mother his own nice house among the
mountains and we're all going there next week--such a long way in the
train, Milly."
"What are mountains?" said Olly, who had scarcely ever seen a hill
higher than the church steeple. "They can't be so nice as the sea,
mother. Nothing can."
"They're humps, Olly," answered Milly eagerly. "Great, big humps of
earth, you know; earth mixed with stone. And they reach up ever so high,
up into the sky. And it takes you a whole day to get up to the top of
them, and a whole day to get down again. Doesn't it, mother? Fräulein
told me all about mountains in my geography. And some mountains have got
snow on their tops all year, even in summer, when it's so hot, and we're
having strawberries. Will the mountains we're going to, have snow on
them?"
"Oh, no. The snow mountains are far away over the sea. But these are
English mountains, kind, easy mountains, not too high for you and me to
climb up, and covered all over with soft green grass and wild flowers,
and tiny sheep with black faces."
"And, mother, is there a garden to Uncle Richard's house, and are there
any children there to play with?"
"There's a delightful garden, full of roses, and strawberries and
grapes, and everything else that's nice. And it has a baby river all to
itself, that runs and jumps and chatters all through the middle of it,
so perhaps Olly may have a paddle sometimes, though we aren't going to
the sea. And the gardener has got two little children, just about your
age, Aunt Mary says: and there are two more at the farm, two dear little
girls, who aren't a bit shy, and will like playing with you very much.
But who else shall we see there, Milly? Who lives in the mountains too,
near Uncle Richard?"
Olly looked puzzled, but Milly thought a minute, and then said quickly,
"Aunt Emma, isn't it, mother? Didn't she come here once? I think I
remember."
"Yes, she came once, but long ago, when you were quite small. But now we
shall see a great deal of her I hope, for she lives just on the other
side of the mountain from Uncle Richard's house, in a dear old house,
where I spent many, many happy days when I was small. Great-grandpapa
and grandmamma were alive then. But now Aunt Emma lives there quite
alone. Except for one creature, at least, an old gray poll-parrot, that
chatters away, and behaves as if it were quite sensible, and knew all
about everything."
"Hasn't she got any pussies, mother?" asked Olly.
"Yes, two I believe; but they don't get on with Polly very well, so they
live in the kitchen out of the way--"
"I like pussies better than pollies," said Olly gravely.
"Why, what do you know about pollies, old man?"
"Pollies bite, I know they do. There was a polly bited Francis once."
"Well, and pussies scratch," said Milly.
"No, they don't, not if you're nicey to them," said Olly; who was just
then very much in love with a white kitten, and thought there were no
creatures so delightful as pussies.
"Well, suppose you don't make up your mind about Aunt Emma's Polly till
you've seen her," said Mrs. Norton. "Now sit down on the rug there and
let us have a talk."
Down squatted the children on the floor opposite their mother, with
their little heads full of plans and their eyes as bright as sparks.
"I'll take my cart and horse," began Olly; "and my big ball, and my
whistle, and my wheelbarrow, and my spade, and all my books, and the big
scrap-book, and--"
"You can't, Olly," exclaimed Milly. "Nurse could never pack all those
up. There'd be no room for our clothes. You can take your whistle, and
the top, and the picture books, and I can take my dolls. That'll be
quite enough, won't it, mother?"
"Quite enough," said Mrs. Norton. "If it's fine weather you'll see--you
won't want any toys. But now, look here, children," and she held up the
map. "Shall I show you how we are going to get to the mountains?"
"Oh yes," said Milly, "that'll be like my geography lesson--come, Olly.
Now mother'll teach _you_ geography, like Fräulein does me."
"That's lessons," said Olly, with half a pout, "not fun a bit. It's only
girls like lessons--Boys never do--Jacky doesn't, and Francis doesn't,
and I don't."
"Never mind about it's being lessons, Olly. Come and see if it isn't
interesting," said Mrs. Norton. "Now, Milly, find Willingham."
Willingham was the name of the town where Milly and Oliver lived. It is
a little town in Oxfordshire, and if you look long enough on the map you
_may_ find it, though I won't promise you.
"There it is," said Milly triumphantly, showing it to her mother and
Olly.
"Quite right. Now look here," and Mrs. Norton took a pencil out of her
pocket and drew a little line along the map. "First of all we shall get
into the train and go to a place called--look, Milly."
"Bletchley," said Milly, following where the pencil pointed. "What an
ugly name."
"It's an ugly place," said Mrs. Norton, "so perhaps it doesn't deserve a
better name. And after Bletchley--look again, Milly."
"Rugby," said Milly, reading the names as her mother pointed, "and then
Stafford, and then Crewe--what a funny name, mother!--and then Wigan,
and then Warrington, and then Lancaster. Ox-en-holme, Kendal,
Wind-er-mere. Oh, mother, what a long way! Why, we've got right to the
top of England."
"Stop a bit, Milly, and let me tell you something about these places.
First of all we shall get out of the train at Bletchley, and get into
another train that will go faster than the first. And it will take us
past all kinds of places, some pretty and some ugly, and some big and
some small. At Stafford there is an old castle, Milly, where fierce
people lived in old days and fought their neighbours. And at Crewe we
shall get out and have our dinner. And at Wigan all the trees grow on
one side as if some one had come and given them a push in the night; and
at Lancaster there's another old castle, a very famous one, only now
they have turned it into a prison, and people are shut up inside it.
Then a little way after Lancaster you'll begin to see some mountains,
far, far away, but first you'll see something else--just a little bit of
blue sea, with mountains on the other side of it. And then will come
Windermere, where we shall get out and drive in a carriage. And we shall
drive right into the mountains, Olly, till they stand up all round us
with their dear kind old faces that mother has loved ever since she was
a baby."
The children looked up wonderingly at their mother, and they saw her
face shining and her eyes as bright as theirs, as if she too was a child
going out for a holiday.
"Oh! And, mother," said Olly, "you'll let us take Spot. She can go in my
box."
Now Spot was the white kitten, so Milly and mother began to laugh.
"Suppose you go and ask Spot first, whether she'd like it, Olly," said
Mrs. Norton, patting his sunburnt little face.