Chapter IV: Part 4

Gae tak' thae bonnie feathers o' mine,
The feathers o' my tail:
And gie to the lads o' Hamilton
To be a barn-flail.

And tak' thae bonnie feathers o' mine,
The feathers o' my breast:
And gie to ony bonnie lad
Will bring to me a priest.

Now in there came my Lady Wren
Wi' mony a sigh and groan:
O what care I for a' the lads
If my ain lad be gone!

Then Robin turned him roundabout,
E'en like a little king;
Go; pack ye out o' my chamber-door,
Ye little cutty quean!

Robin made his testament
Upon a coll of hay;
And by cam' a greedy gled
And snapt him a' away.

CHILDREN'S HUMOUR AND QUAINT SAYINGS.

The humours of little folks, fresh and original, and invariably of the unconscious variety, and their quaint sayings, unrehearsed and uttered regularly without regard to effect--though with merciless honesty often--form a never-palling treat; and every man and woman who has reared a family, or has had joy in the society of other people's children, has his and her own budget, comprising tit-bits at once interesting, startling, and amusing. When occasion has saved us from the foolishly doting parent who is everlastingly prosing about the very clever things his own little Johnnie has said or done, I have seldom found greater enjoyment of a mixed company than when the queer sayings of children went round the board, and we had "recollections," by suggestion, of things which perhaps had been better left unsaid, as also of things which had been more agreeably expressed if differently worded; yet all so honestly set forth that even the "victims" could not help but enjoy them in some measure. Children accept all statements so implicitly, and, with their quick-working wits, they reason so straight-forwardly, that the application when voiced comes at times with a bang sufficient to take one's breath away. Given this and that, however, an application is unavoidable. As lief set fire behind powder in a gun and expect there will be no report. A mite of five, thus, will on occasion utter a syllogism that would not discredit a professor of logic, or will put a question to which a whole college of theologians might not venture an answer. A little lady of my acquaintance who had not yet seen her fourth birthday, was one morning told by her mother that she could not get out to play--the frost was too severe. "Who makes the frost, ma?" was asked. "God, dear." "What does He make frost for?" "To kill the worms." "And why does He make worms, and has to make frost to kill them?" This was a sufficient poser, but the mother continued, "The worms have to be killed, else they would eat the roots of all the plants and flowers." The little lady reflected, then gravely asked, "But does God kill the wee chicky worms that never eated any roots?" The mother did not answer, but looked now even more grave than the child. The same little miss was listening one evening to a newspaper report being read, which told how a man in a storm of wind had been blown with a ladder from a house-top in Glasgow, and was killed. "Who makes the wind?" she asked sharply. She was told. "And does God make the bad winds that kills the mans?" was demanded. There was no reply; but she read the silence as meaning "yes," and turning to leave the room she muttered more to herself than otherwise, "When I die and go to Heaven I'll not sit beside God." When repeating the _Pater-noster_ one evening she stuck at the first sentence, and wanted to know "If God is our Father in Heaven who is our Mother in Heaven?" But the mother was saved this time by the interposition of the little one's elder brother, who, with stern emphasis, exclaimed, "Stupid! God's wife, of course." A little boy-relative of that girl returned from school one day, while he was but a pupil in the infant department, and stepping proudly up to where his father was seated, "Pa," he exclaimed, "I am the cleverest boy in the class." "Indeed," returned the parent, "I am proud to hear that; but who said it?" "The teacher." "If the teacher said so, it surely must be true. What did she say, though?" "She said, 'Stand up the cleverest boy in the class,' and I stood up." The same little fellow was on the way to school with a friend one morning, towards the end of December, when the two were attracted by the appearance of a sweep on the chimney of a neighbouring building. "I ken what that man's doin' up there," he asserted; "he's sweepin' the lums for Santa Claus to get doon." And that recalls the story I once heard of a little man in the Carse of Gowrie. It happened on an evening towards the close of the year, as he was preparing for bed, and was sitting by the fire with his first liberated stocking in his hand, that he looked over to his mother, and "Mither," he asked, "will I get a pair o' new stockin's before Christmas?" "Maybe, laddie; but what gars ye speir?" "Because"--and he spoke mournfully, as he stuck his fingers through a large hole in the toe--"if Santa Claus puts onything intil thir anes, it'll fa' oot." How cleverly they reason, you see! "Bring me a drink o' water, Johnnie," was the order delivered by a Perthshire farmer to his little son one day a good many years ago. The boy went to do as he was asked, but the water-stoup had been nearly empty, and, as he was approaching his parent with the liquid, he paused and peered doubtfully into the hand-vessel, then, as if suddenly inspired by a happy thought, "Will I put meal in't, father?" he asked. "No." "Oh, weel, then"--and he turned to go back--"ye'll need to wait till somebody gangs to the well." But to return to children I have known for yet one or two more illustrations. I was at a tea-table one afternoon where the company was mostly composed of the smaller fry, and an incident, important to all, was mentioned, which had happened some seven or eight years before. Several of the older children declared, truthfully, that they remembered it quite well. "So do I mind o' it," asserted a little fellow about five. "How could you mind o' it?" questioned scornfully an older brother; "you wasna born at the time." "I ken," as scornfully returned the younger theologian; "I was dust at the time; but I mind o' it weel enough." Here is the verbatim copy of a letter written since by the hand of that same boy--in a country village in Perthshire--where he has been staying continuously for several years, and addressed to his father in Glasgow:--"Dear Pa, The Rabbits is all dead. Worried with dogs. The gold fishes is dead. Died with the cold. The cat has had kittens, four of them, and the rest of us is all well." The remark of a prominent Scottish novelist who recently passed the epistle through his hands was--"That's style, the most crisp and picturesque. And then--'the rest of us'--how beautifully innocent!"

The little girl of a friend of mind--while still of very tender years--was first taken to church by her aunt. On the way home, and soon after leaving the portals of the sacred edifice, she looked up solemnly in her guardian's face, and, "Auntie," she asked, "was yon God on the mantel-piece?" She referred doubtless to the minister in the pulpit. Don't think of irreverence, my reader! The child, in its atmosphere of perfect innocence, knows not the word. And bear that in mind further when I tell you of a little boy and girl--both of whom I know well--who were having a walk with me one Sunday in early Autumn, when suddenly a railway train appeared in view. A train on Sunday! They were staggered by the sight; and the boy demanded to know why it should be there. "Oh, I know," exclaimed the girl, after some reflection; "it'll be God coming back from his holidays." The question, "Can prayer be answered?" may be often discussed by grown-up minds. It is never raised by the children. No doubts trouble them in that relation. They are quite certain they will get what they ask for. Perfect confidence in that alone could have made it possible for a certain little miss, who, when being put to bed in a tired condition, and asked to say her prayer, began:--

"This night I lay me down to sleep,
I pray the Lord----"

then gave a long, loud yawn, and added, "Oh God, I am awfully sleepy--you know the rest"--making thus, in her rude simplicity, a finely trustful and beautiful prayer. "Give us each day our daily bread," was the honest petition of a little fellow--who, however, recalling probably some recent violent experiences, immediately added--"but dinna let our Lizzie bake it." An elaborately-trained little fellow who had nightly to pray for blessings on "mamma, and papa, grandpapa, and grandmamma," and all his uncles, his aunts, and his cousins, committing each by name, after exhausting the catalogue one evening, heaved a heavy sigh and exclaimed wearily, "Oh, dear, I wish these people would pray for themselves, for I am so tired of praying for them all!"

A little girl, whose baby brother had died, was told that he had gone to Heaven, and that night she refused to pray--"Take me to Heaven for Jesus' sake"--because, as she said; "I don't want to go to Heaven, I want to stay here, with ma, and pa, and dolly." Were all prayers as honest, many of them, I suspect, would be much shorter than they are.

I have heard of a little boy who was continually being told that he should be good.

"And if I am gooder, and gooder," he asked, "what will I be?"

"Oh, you will be a little angel."

"But I don't want to be an angel," he retorted; "I want to be an engine-driver." They are never else than frank in their statements. A mother who suffers from severe headaches, said to her little girl about eight, one day not long ago, "What would you do, Lottie dear, if your darling mother was taken away from you--if she died?" "Well, mother," was the little one's startling answer, "I suppose we would cry at first--then we would bury you, and then we would come home and take all the money out of your pocket." Now, while it is possible that something else might also be done, it is almost certain--yea, it is certain, without doubt--that all these ceremonials, however reluctantly, would, in turn, be duly performed.

From a story bearing on death to one relating to birth is a transition not so unnatural as may at the first blush appear. And births are affairs ever of prime interest to children. Not many years ago it happened in a village in Perthshire that twins arrived in a family, and next day one of the little misses of the house was out on the street playing, when a neighbouring lady came up to where she was, and, "So you've got two little babies at home, Bizzie," she remarked. "Yes," responded the little one, very solemnly; "and do you know, my father was away at Edinburgh when the doctor brought them. But it was a good thing my mother was in; for if she hadna, there would have been naebody in the house but me, and I wadna have kent what to do wi' them." They tell this delightful story of the little daughter of Professor Van Dyke, of the Philadelphia University:--

"Papa, where were you born?"

"In Boston, my dear."

"Where was mamma born?"

"In San Francisco."

"And where was I born?"

"In Philadelphia."

"Well, pap, isn't it funny how we three people got together?"

And that now recalls another which Mrs. Keeley, the actress, tells of a tradesman's little boy who was often taken to stay with his grandmother and grandfather--the latter a very feeble old man, bald and toothless. This little fellow was told that his father and mother had "bought" a nice new baby brother for him. The little man was much interested by the news, and was taken to see the new arrival. He looked at it with astonishment for a few seconds, then remarked--"Why, he's got no hair, father!" This was at once admitted. "And he's got no teeth," observed the boy again, touching another fact which could not be denied. Then a long and thoughtful pause ensued, after which the little critic (who had probably been comparing the baby with his grandfather), observed confidentially--"I'll tell you what, father; if they called him a new baby, they've taken you in--he's an old 'un!" You cannot easily get round children. And it is almost impossible to suppress them. As touching this fact an excellent story is told of our present King and his sister, the late Empress of Germany, when they were boy and girl. Lord----, who had a deformed foot, was invited to Osborne; and before his arrival the Queen and Prince Albert debated whether it would be better to warn the Prince of Wales and the Princess Royal of his physical calamity, so as to avoid embarrassing remarks, or to leave the matter to their own good feeling. The latter course was adopted. Lord ---- duly arrived. The foot elicited no remark from the Royal children, and the visit passed off with perfect success. But next day the Princess Royal asked the Queen, "Where is Lord----?" "He has gone back to London, dear." "Oh, what a pity! He had promised to show Berty and me his foot!" The _enfants terrible_ had wilily caught his lordship in the corridor, and made their own terms.

There is pleasure in telling that story were it but for the revelation it affords of how the children of Kings and Queens are animated by the same curiosities, and may act at times so like the children of the commonality. That Royalty again may be moved by the action or word of a child of common birth we have many pleasing proofs. One is pat. A late King of Prussia, while visiting in one of the villages of his dominion, was welcomed by the school children. Their sponsor made a speech for them. The King thanked them. Then, taking an orange from a plate, he asked--"To what kingdom does this belong?" "The vegetable kingdom, sire," replied a little girl. The King next took a gold coin from his pocket, and, holding it up, asked--"And to what kingdom does this belong?" "To the mineral kingdom," was the reply. "And to what kingdom do I belong then?" asked the King. The little girl coloured deeply; for she did not like to say the "animal kingdom," as he thought she would, lest His Majesty should be offended. But just then it flashed upon her mind that "God made man in His own image," and looking up with brightening eye, she said--"To God's Kingdom, sire." The King was moved. A tear stood in his eye. He placed his hand on the child's head, and said, most devoutly--"God grant that I may be accounted worthy of that Kingdom." Thus did the words of a common child, you see, move the heart of a King. But, oh, we are all the same. It is only the environment that is different. And the distinction there even is not so great as one, not knowing, may be disposed to imagine. In high and low life alike, anyway, the children, we know, are free; and all alike are susceptible of eccentricity. What a fine confession of this the Princess of Wales made not long ago when, as Duchess of York, she was addressing a Girls' Society in London. As a school-girl, she said, she disliked geography; of which, she added, she was very ignorant. Once she was set to draw an outline map of the world from memory. "On showing it to my governess," said the Princess, "she said in quite an alarmed manner--'Why, you have left out China! Don't you know where it is?' 'Yes,' I replied, very stubbornly, but very loyally, 'I know where it should be, but I am not going to put it in my map. The Queen is angry with China now, so it has no right to have a place in the world at all.'" The spirit of exclusiveness manifested by the little lady might readily be quarrelled with in some quarters; but surely the act gives promise of a Queen who, like her to whom she was loyal, will, when her glory cometh--though, may it be far distant--prove the pride of every loyal Briton!

The somersaultic cleverness by which a child will get out of an awkward situation has been often revealed, but seldom with more humour than in the two succeeding illustrations. A minister returning from church towards the manse on a Sunday, came suddenly on a boy leaning earnestly over the parapet of a bridge with a short rod and a long string having a baited hook on the far end, by which he was trying his luck in the burn beneath. "Boy," he exclaimed severely, "is this a day on which you should be catching fish?" "Wha's catchin' fish?" drawled the budding Isaac Walton; "I'm juist tryin' to droon this worm." The next boy was yet cleverer--alike in fishing and in speech. He had several trout dangling from his hand by a string when he met the minister abruptly in a quick bend of the road. There was no chance of escape; but his ready wit saved him. He walked boldly forward, and taking the first word as the two were about to meet, he dangled the trout-hand high, looked the minister square in the face, and exclaimed, "That sorts them for snappin' at flees on the Sabbath!" and passed hence, leaving his anticipated accuser flabbergasted.

Ruskin says of children: "They are forced by nature to develop their powers of invention, as a bird its feathers of flight;" and we might add, remarks another writer, "that the inventive faculty, like a bird, is apt, when fully grown, to fly away. Then, when their own imaginative resources begin to fail them, one observes children begin to read books of adventure with avidity--at the age, say, of ten or twelve years. Before that, no Rover of the Andes or Erling the Bold can equal the heroic achievements they evolve from their inner consciousness." Who, for instance, could hope to "put a patch" on the experience of those two little boys who spent a snowy day during the Christmas holidays tiger-shooting in their father's dining-room; and as one, making his cautious way among the legs of the dinner-table, for the nonce a pathless jungle, was hailed by the other with, "Any tigers there, Bill?" he answered gloriously: "Tigers? I'm knee-deep in them!"

That excellent story recalls to me another, not unlike it. Also of a Christmas time. The children had asked permission to get up a play, and it had been granted on the condition that they did it all themselves without help or hint. As the eldest was only ten they accepted the condition with alacrity, for young children hate to be interfered with and hampered by their elders. When the evening came and the family and audience had collected, the curtain was drawn back and revealed the heroine (aged nine), who stated with impassioned sobs that her husband had been in South Africa for the past three years, but that she was expecting his return. Truly enough the hero (aged ten) entered, and proceeded, after affectionate but hasty greetings, to give his wife an eloquent account of his doings, the battles he had fought, the Boers he had killed, and the honours he had won.

When he at last paused for breath, his wife rose, and taking his hand led him to the back, where a short curtain covered a recess. "I, too, dear," she said proudly, "have not been idle."

And pulling back the curtain she displayed six cradles occupied by six large baby dolls!

And that again recalls another, quite in the same line. One day a gentleman walking down a street observed a little boy seated on a doorstep. Going up to him, he said, "Well, my little chap, how is it you are sitting outside on the doorstep, when I see through the window all the other young folks inside playing games and having a good time? Why aren't you inside joining in the fun?" "I guess, stranger, that I'm in this game." replied the boy. "But how can you be, when you are out on the doorstep, and the others are all inside?" "Oh, I'm in the show right enough. You see, we're playing at being married. I'm the baby, and I'm not born yet!"

The late Dr. Norman M'cLeod--the great Norman--rejoiced in telling a story about two ragged children whom he found busy on the side of a country road one day, working with some stiffened mud, which they had carefully scraped together. "What's this you are making?" he asked. One of the children replied that it was a kirk. "A kirk! Ay, and where's the door?" "There it's." "And the pulpit?" "That's it." "And the minister?" The little one hesitated, then replied, very innocently--"We hadna dirt enough left to mak' a minister."

The minister, of course--and the weaker his character he should be the more careful--must always approach children with caution if he hopes to come out of the interview with his reputation unscathed. I have heard or read of a member of the cloth--a supreme egoist--who was visiting at a house when but the mother and her little girl--a mere child--were at home. As the self-esteemed great man was holding the mother in conversation, he noticed with pride that the child, who reposed on the hearthrug with a school-slate tilted on her knee, was making furtive glances up at his face, and returning her attention regularly to the slate, on which she kept scrawling with a pencil. When at length she stopped and looked serious, "Well, my dear," he exclaimed, "have you been trying to draw my portrait?" She did not reply, "Come," he continued, coaxingly, "you must let me see it." "Oh," interposed the proud mother, "she's awfu' clever at the drawin'." This made the minister still more eager to see the work, and he repeated his request for an exposure; but the child clutched the slate only more tightly to her breast and did not look up. "She's aye sae shy, ye ken," interceded the mother, as she reached her hand to procure the work of art by main force. It was then the little one found her tongue, and she exclaimed--"Oh, it wasna very like him, and I just put a tail till't, and ca'd it a doggie." The _denouement_ leaves nothing to be desired.

Dean Ramsay, to whom his country owes so much for the elucidation of its characteristics, tells humorously of the elder of a kirk having found a little boy and his sister playing marbles on Sunday, and put his reproof not at all in judicious form by exclaiming--"Boy, do you know where children go who play marbles on the Sabbath-day?" Not in judicious form, truly, for the boy replied, "Ay, they gang doun to the field by the water below the brig." "No," roared out the elder, "they go to hell, and are burned." Worse than ever--for the elder--for the little fellow, really shocked, now called to his sister, "Come awa', Jeanie, here's a man swearin' awfu'."

"Among the lower orders in Scotland humour is found, occasionally, very rich in mere children," observes the Dean, "and I recollect a remarkable illustration of this early native humour occurring in a family in Forfarshire, where I used in former days to be very intimate. A wretched woman, who used to traverse the country as a beggar or tramp, left a poor half-starved little girl by the road-side near the house of my friends. Always ready to assist the unfortunate, they took charge of the child, and as she grew a little older they began to give her some education, and taught her to read. She soon made some progress in reading the Bible, and the native odd humour of which we speak began soon to show itself. On reading the passage which began 'Then David rose,' etc., the child stopped and looked up knowingly to say, 'I ken wha that was,' and being asked what she could mean, she confidently said, 'That's David Rowse the pleuchman.' And again, reading the passage where the words occur, 'He took Paul's girdle,' the child said, with much confidence, 'I ken what he took that for;' and on being asked to explain, replied at once, 'To bake his bannocks on.'"

Among less than a dozen examples in all of child humour, the good Dean has yet another worth telling, which he says, used to be narrated by an old Mr. Campbell of Jura, who told the story of his own son. The boy, it seems, was much spoilt by indulgence. In fact, the parents were scarce able to refuse him anything he demanded. He was in the drawing-room on one occasion when dinner was announced, and on being ordered up to the nursery he insisted on going down to dinner with the company. His mother was for refusal, but the child persevered and kept saying, "If I dinna gang, I'll tell yon." His father then, for peace sake, let him go. So he went, and sat at the table by his mother. When he found every one getting soup and himself omitted, he demanded soup, and repeated, "If I dinna get it, I'll tell yon." Well, soup was given, and various other things yielded to his importunities, to which he always added the usual threat of "telling yon." At last, when it came to wine, his mother stood firm, and positively refused, as "a bad thing for little boys," and so on. He then became more vociferous than ever about "telling yon;" and, as still he was refused, he declared, "Now I'll tell yon," and at last roared out--"_My new breeks are made oot o' the auld curtains!_"

That, however, is not the most delectable of child stories. We prefer the ideas of the little folks within the region of philosophy. When, for example, they want to know "Whaur div' a' the figures gang when they're rubbit oot?" and ask such questions as "Where does the dark go when the light comes?" "Was it not very wrong of God not to make Cain good as well as Abel?" or, "If it be true that some of the stars are bigger than this earth, how do they not keep the rain off?"

"I say, father," asked a little fellow as he raised his eyes off his home lesson, "Who invented the multiplication table?" "Oh, I don't know," he was answered; "it was invented long ago; why?"

"Well, I was thinking if the gentleman that invented it didn't know it already, he must have had a tough job; and if he did know it, what was the good of him inventing it at all?" It was a cloudy and moonless night when a little fellow was taken out by his mother, who went to call for a friend. "Mamma," he exclaimed, looking up, "I expect God's been very busy this evening, for I see He has forgotten to hang the stars out."

She was a very small Miss who went to church alone one day, where an organ had recently been introduced. As she stood gazing about just within the door, an elder approached, and asked where she would prefer to sit. "Well," she said pertly, "if there's a monkey, I would like to be near the organ; but if there's no' a monkey, I'll just sit ony place."

A pretty good story is related of one of Governor Tilton's staff. It is said that when the individual referred to first presented himself _en militaire_ to his wife and little daughter, the latter, after gazing at him for a few minutes, turned to her mother, and exclaimed: "Why, Ma, that's not a real soldier--it's Pa!" Equally observant was another youngster, who was sent by his parent to take a letter to the post-office and pay the postage on it. The boy returned highly elated, and said: "Father, I seed a lot of men putting letters in a little place; and when no one was looking, I slipped yours in for nothing." We hardly know whether the father would laugh or storm over this unconscious attempt to defraud the revenue. But no matter.

Two little London girls who had been sent by the kindness of the vicar's wife to have "a happy day in the country," narrating their experiences on their return, said, "Oh, yes, mum, we did 'ave a happy day. We saw two pigs killed and a gentleman buried."

It is the rare that fascinates. Many years ago, I was living in a house where, on an evening, a little Miss was toiling over her school-lesson, and declaiming loudly, "The--sow--has--pigs." Being a city child, I wondered whether she knew of what she was reading, and asked, "Did you ever see a sow and pigs, Mary?" "No," she replied smartly, "but when I was going to the school the day, I saw a policeman getting his photograph taken."

But speaking here of London children, reminds me of two London stories which should not be omitted. So here:--

Two small boys walking down Tottenham Court Road, passed a tobacconist's shop. The bigger remarked--"I say, Bill, I've got a ha-penny, and if you've got one too, we'll have a penny smoke between us."

Bill produced his copper, and Tommy, diving into the shop, promptly re-appeared with a penny cigar in his mouth.

The boys walked side by side for a few minutes, when the smaller mildly said, "I say, Tom, when am I to have a puff? The weed's half mine."

"Oh, you shut up," was the business-like reply. "I'm the chairman of this company, and you are only a shareholder. You can spit."

That is the first. The second, though less precocious, is yet more enjoyable. Besides, we know it is true, while the other--well, it is not above suspicion.

One day, when seeking a model, Miss Dorothy Tennant (now Mrs. H. M. Stanley) discovered a likely subject in the shape of a crossing-sweeper; and, while conducting him to Richmond Terrace, she met her family's old friend, Mr. Gladstone. Greatly moved by her companion, he exclaimed:

"Who's your friend?" Then and there the crossing-sweeper, much to his dismay, was presented to the "People's William."

On entering the Tennant mansion, the urchin was tremendously impressed by the liveried servant who had opened the door, and, after looking back at him several times, whispered mysteriously to his kind hostess:

"I say, miss, why does your big brother wear brass buttons?"

Always thoughtful, Miss Tennant first led her charge to the servants hall, where she sat beside him as he played havoc with the well-filled dishes placed before him. At the conclusion of his repast, Miss Tennant asked the boy how he liked it.

"Proper," replied the crossing-sweeper; "yer mother do cook prime!"

London having yielded its quota, the "Second City" may be again drawn upon.

A little boy of tender years was sitting on the doorstep of a house in Bridgeton, there, the other morning, crying bitterly, when a girl of about the same age accosted him, and the following conversation was overheard:--"What are ye greetin' for, laddie?" she inquired, in sympathetic tones. "Did onybody hit ye?" "N-n-na," sobbed the boy. "Then, what is't ye're greetin' for?" the little damsel went on. "'Cause my wee brither's gane to heaven," exclaimed the little fellow, bitterly, between his sobs. "Oh!" ejaculated the girl; and then, after a pause, "but ye shouldna greet like that--maybe he hasna."

Another. Recently a little fellow came home from school crying bitterly, and altogether manifesting great sorrow. "What's the matter, Geordie," sympathetically inquired his mother, "has onybody been hittin' ye?" "N-n-n-o," answered the boy between his sobs. "Then, what are you crying about?" she went on. "Boo! hoo! wee Sammy Sloan's faither an' mither hae flitted to Coatbrig!" "Tuts, laddie, dinna greet about that," she exclaimed, re-assuringly, "there's plenty mair laddies bidin' in the street besides Sammy Sloan that ye can play wi'." "I ken that," said Geordie, with another sob, "but he was the only yin I could lick."

Children, really, as we have been revealing so frequently here, have the fresh and original notions of things, and are always frank enough to give them voice.

A little boy was reading the story of a missionary having been eaten by cannibals. "Papa," he asked, "will the missionary go to heaven?" "Yes, my son," replied the father. "And will the cannibals go there, too?" queried the youthful student. "No," was the reply. After thinking the matter over for some time, the little fellow exclaimed--"Well, I don't see how the missionary can go to heaven if the cannibals don't, when he's inside the cannibals."

One Sunday evening, while sitting on his mother's knee listening to the story of Jonah being swallowed by the whale, a little fellow looked up seriously into her face and asked, "Ma, did Jonah wear his slippers in the whale's belly? Because, if he didna, the tackets in his boots wad tear a' its puddin's."

Dr. John Ker of Edinburgh, in his recently published volume of reminiscences--_Memories Grave and Gay_--tells of how "in a Banffshire manse one Sunday evening, all the family were sitting quietly reading in the drawing-room, when the youngest boy, with a laudable thirst for knowledge, went up to his mother and asked a question, for the answer to which she referred him to me. Coming up to me, he said--

"'Mr. Ker, is it true that the devil goes about like a roaring lion?"

"'It must,' I replied, 'be true, for it is in the Bible.'

"This was followed by another question which I did not attempt to answer--

"'Then, wha keeps his fire in when he's gaun aboot?'"

"Do you know, mamma, I don't believe Solomon was so rich after all?" observed a sharp boy to his mother, who prided herself on her orthodoxy. "My child!" she exclaimed in pious horror, "what does the Bible say?" "That's just it," he answered. "It says that 'Solomon slept with his fathers.' Now, surely, if he had been rich he'd have had a bed to himself."

A father once said to a little boy, not so obedient as might be desired, "Everything I say to you goes in at one ear and out at the other." "Is that what little boys has two ears for, daddy?" asked the child, quite innocently.

Engaging his tender "hopeful" in the wonders of astronomy--"Men have learned the distances of the stars," observed the father; "and, with their spectroscopes, found out what they are made of." "Yes," responded the boy admiringly; "and isn't it strange, pa, how they found out their names too!"

SCHOOLROOM FACTS AND FANCIES.

These are so numerous as to demand a separate chapter.

Talking of the serpent in the Garden of Eden, a lady teacher asked her class what a serpent was like, when a boy aptly replied, "It's like a lang rope furlin'."

On another occasion, in the same class, the question was, "What does the devil tempt little boys and girls to do?" when the comical answer came, "To chap at fouk's doors, mem."

It has been often told, but is worth repeating, how a pupil teacher was doing his level best to make the children remember Samson's mighty deeds with the jawbone of an ass, and, recapitulating, he asked, "What did Samson slay ten thousand Philistines with? Eh?" No reply came. Then, pointing to his jawbone, he asked, "What is this?" And at once the answer belched proudly from half-a-dozen throats in unison, "The jawbone of an ass."

In a country school the lesson was on "The Prodigal Son," and the question, "What were the husks that the swine did eat?" met with the prompt answer, "Tawtie peelin's." In a city seminary a teacher asked her class, "Who knows everything we say and do?" when she received the unexpected reply, "The fouk that bides next door to us."

Expecting to get the answer "Carnivorous" (as it bore on the lesson), a teacher asked his class for an example of a bird of prey, and among other answers he got was "A yellow yite." The boy who responded so, on being asked to explain, continued, "Because it eats worms."

"What do you call the bird or beast that feeds on both animal and vegetable foods?" was the next question. The teacher anticipated "Omnivorous" this time, but it did not come. There was silence for a little. Then a boy, who evidently had been ruminating, responded nonchalantly, "A gutsy brute, sir."

In examining the boys in the composition of sentences, a master began: "If I ask you," said he, "what have I in my hand? you must not say simply 'Chalk,' but make a full sentence of it, and say, 'You have chalk in your hand.' Now I will proceed. What have I on my feet?" The answer came immediately, "Boots." "Wrong; you haven't been observing my directions," he rebukingly replied. "Stockings," another heedlessly ventured to answer. "Wrong again--worse than ever," wrathfully exclaimed the _magister_. "Well?" he continued interrogatively to a lad near him. "Please, sir," then he paused--perhaps he thought it _might_ sound funny, but he felt it _must_ be right, and so he recklessly gasped out--"Corns!"

But the answers are not always so stupid.

"Why is it," asked a teacher, "the sun never sets on the British possessions?" "Because," slowly responded an ingenuous youngster, "the British possessions are in the north, south, and east, and the sun always sets in the west."

During a recent School Board examination in the west of Scotland, the examiner asked a little girl to explain what was meant by the expression, _He was amply rewarded._ "Paid for't," was her instant reply. "No, no; you are wrong. Suppose you have to go into a baker's shop and buy a half-quarter loaf, and lay down fourpence, would you say you had amply rewarded the baker?" Unhesitatingly she replied "Yes." "Why?" "Because the loaf's only twopence-three-farthings," was the unlooked-for answer.

Quite like that is the story of a small boy into whose head a teacher was one day labouring almost in vain to get, as he thought, even the faintest correct notion of the first rule in arithmetic. "Look here now, Johnnie," he said at length, "if I were to give you two rabbits and your father were to give you three rabbits, how many rabbits would you then have?" "Six." "No, no;" and the teacher set out bits of chalk to show how he could only have five. "Ah, but," drawled out Johnnie, "I have a rabbit at hame already."

It was a notion of multiplication that another teacher was endeavouring to get properly lodged within the skull of another boy, and by way of putting the effort to a practical test, he said: "Now, Peter, suppose I was a tailor who supplied your father with a suit of clothes for three pounds, which he promised to pay me in weekly instalments of one shilling, how much would your father be due me at the end of a year?" "Three pounds," replied Peter slowly. "Nonsense, Peter; think again." Peter thought again, but again answered as before. "You don't know that simple sum!" exclaimed the teacher in amazement. "Ay, I ken it weel enough," responded Peter, "but ye dinna ken my faither."

"Did any of you ever see an elephant's skin?" asked the master of an infant school. "I have," shouted a six-year-old at the foot of the class. "Where?" "On the elephant."

A little boy of my acquaintance, while yet a pupil in the infant department, was one day given a slate more to engage his attention than aught else. But he had some notion of drawing, and when the teacher came round she was astonished to find he had set down a fair picture of a bird on a bough. "Ha! who drew this?" she asked. "Mysel'," was the canny Scotch reply. "And who's mysel'?" she queried. "Oh, I'm fine," was the second response, not less Scotch than the first. The English reader, of course, won't fairly understand the word "fine" as spoken there; but every Scotsman will, as also how "who's" may be mistaken for "how's."

There is another "fine" story. It was asked of a class, "How did the Israelites get across the Red Sea?" "Fine," exclaimed a youth with brightening eyes; "'twas the 'Gyptians was droon'd."

"What do you mean by a temperate region?" asked an inspector of a class, putting due emphasis on the word temperate. "The region, sir," responded a boy "where they drinks only temperants drinks."

Not long ago a class of boys were being examined on the different kinds of wood; and one little chap was asked to name the specimen (a piece of mahogany) which was held in the examiner's hand. He hesitated, and the inspector, by way of suggestion, remarked, "Why, don't you know the materials that your mother's drawers are made of?" This seemed to simplify the matter, and, amidst a roar of laughter, came the quick reply--"Flannelette!"

"Name anything friable," said a teacher. "Ham," was the ready answer.

"What is a papal bull?"

"A golden calf."

"What is ice?"

"Water fast asleep."

"What is a skeleton?"

"A man without any meat on it."

A teacher was examining a class on the battle of Bannockburn, and asked, "Who killed de Bohun?" No one knew. He raised his arm in an attitude of striking, and yelled, with flashing eyes, "Who killed de Bohun, I say?" A little fellow near him, who expected the blow, raised his arm in a defensive attitude, and whined, "Oh, please, sir, it wasna me."

"What is meant by faith?" was one day asked of a class. "Faith," responded a thoughtful youth, "is the faculty which enables us to believe things that we know to be not true."

In the lesson of a class of country boys not long ago, the words "above the average" occurred, and the lady teacher asked if any one could tell what the word "average" meant. There was no response for a time, and she passed the question from one to another until a more than average specimen eagerly responded, "It's a thing that hens lay on." The teacher was dumb-founded, and asked for an explanation. "Well," drawled the budding Solomon, "my mother says that our hens lay each four eggs a week--on an average."

It is a teacher's business to observe that his scholars are clean as well as clever, and the Rev. David Macrae, in his entertaining little book of _Quaint Sayings of Children_, tells how a teacher, after glancing round the class one day, said to a boy, "I'll let you off if you can find a hand in all the school as dirty as that one," indicating the boy's own grimy exposed paw. The youth promptly brought forth and showed his other fist, which was certainly dirtier still, and the master, in view of his pledge, had no resource but to let the offender go for that time any way.

An old story, which has had a lively currency, tells of how a boy when he returned from school was always asked where he stood in his class, and whose invariable answer was, "I'm second dux." For the regular holding of this excellent position he received many fine things in the shape of sweets and biscuits, and pennies, etc., until at length it occurred to one of the family to ask him how many were in his class. It was then the gilt fell off the ginger-bread. "Oh," said he, "there's just me and anither lassie."

Dean Ramsay tells of a very practical answer given by a little girl who had been asked the meaning of "darkness," as it occurred in Scripture reading--"Just steek your een." In the same place, he says, on the question, "What is the pestilence that walketh in darkness?" being put to a class, a little boy answered, after consideration, "Oh, it's just _bugs_."

Our friend, Dr. John Ker, has often told of an occasion when he was examining a class in mathematics, and put the question to a boy--"If a salmon weighed 16 lbs., and was to be sold at 2d. per lb., what would it be worth?"--and how the lad, who was the son of a fishmonger, hastily replied--"It wadna be worth a curse!" Salmon at that price, I should say, would nowhere in these days be esteemed above suspicion anyway. And boys _will_ be frank even although their replies at times appear more smart than respectful. Once a Cockney manufacturer was taking part in a school examination and asked a boy pompously--"W'at's the capital of 'Olland?" "H," was the unconsciously smart reply given. And that recalls a good dialect story, under the early Board system, which tells how an English clergyman and a Lowland Scotsman entered one of the best schools in Aberdeen. The master received them kindly, and enquired--

"Would you prefer that I should spier (question) the boys, or that you should spier them?"

The English clergyman desired the master to proceed. He did so with great success, and the boys answered satisfactorily numerous interrogatories as to the exodus of the Israelites from Egypt. The clergyman then said he would be glad to "spier the boys," and at once began--

"How did Pharaoh die?"

There was a dead silence.

In his dilemma the Lowland gentleman interposed.

"I think, sir, the boys are not accustomed to your English accent; let me try what I can make of them." And he inquired in broad Scotch--

"Hoo did Phawroah dee?"

Again there was a dead silence, upon which the master said--

"Noo, boys, fat cam' to Phawroah at his hinner end?"

The boys with one voice answered--

"He was drooned."

And a smart little fellow added--

"Ony lassie could hae tell't ye that."

Not unlike the above is a story told by Dr. Ker. The venerable inspector was one day putting a class "through its facings," and asked a boy where the River Dee was. The answer came correctly, "In Aberdeenshire."

"Assuming quite a serious look (says Dr. Ker), I asked him if he was not mistaken, adding that I thought the Dee was in Kirkcudbright, and flowed into the Solway Firth. He was a bashful boy, and made no reply. To give the class a needed fillip, I appealed to them to settle whether I or the boy was right. To give a verdict against the inspector was, of course, not to be thought of, and there was silence for a time; but at last a boy put his hand to his mouth, and said to his neighbour in a stage whisper not meant for, but which reached my ear--'He disna ken there's twa Dees.'"

Once by way of stimulant, the doctor asked a somewhat sleepy history class which of the four Georges wore the largest hat? and a boy who had not till then opened his mouth, replied--"Him that had the biggest heid."

In an Ayrshire town, immediately after the Whitsunday term a year or two ago, a female teacher asked her class of little ones to be sure all of them and bring their new addresses to her on the morrow, as these were required for the re-adjustment of the register. "Please, mem," blurted out a wee fellow in petticoats, "my mither says I'm no' to get ony mair dresses. She's gaun to mak' a suit for me oot o' my faither's auld breeks."

Sunday school stories are not inferior to those of the week-day seminary in their irresistible fun and drollery.

A Sunday school teacher asked her scholars to learn an appropriate text to say as they gave in their pennies to the next collection. The first was--"He that giveth to the poor lendeth to the Lord"; and all went right until it came to the last boy, who, reluctantly dropping his penny into the box, said--to the great amazement of teachers and scholars--"The fool and his money are soon parted!"

As an example of the error of talking figuratively to those who do not appreciate, and who are apt to take everything literally, a story is worth telling. The respected superintendent of a Sunday school had told his boys that they should endeavour to bring their neighbours to the school, saying that they should be like a train--the scholar being the engine, and his converts the carriages. Judge of his surprise when, next Sunday, the door opened during lessons, and a little boy, making a noise like an engine, ran in, followed by half-a-dozen others in single file at his back! He came to a halt before the superintendent, who asked the meaning of it all. The naive answer was--"Please, sir, I'm the engine, and them's the carriages."

A Sabbath school teacher, at the finish of a lesson on "The Fall," asked--"Now, children, what lesson can we learn from the story of Adam and Eve? Well, Johnnie?" Johnnie--"Never believe what your wife says."

A lady asked one of the children in her class, "What was the sin of the Pharisees?" "Eating camels, ma'am," was the reply. The little girl who answered had read that the Pharisees "strained at gnats and swallowed camels." "In what condition was the patriarch Job at the end of his life?" questioned a teacher of a stolid-looking boy. "Dead," was the quiet response.

"What is the outward and visible sign in baptism?" asked a lady. There was silence for some seconds, and then a girl broke in triumphantly with, "The baby, please, mem."

The Rev. David Macrae tells that in a Brooklyn Sunday school a small boy was asked the question, "Who was the first man?" and, with characteristic American cocksureness, he immediately replied, "General Washington." The teacher smiled, then asked--"Did you never hear of Adam?" "Why, yes," responded the child, "I've heard of Adam; but I didn't know you were counting foreigners."

Recently, in a Sunday school in Scotland, a little boy, who had been transferred to a new class, was asked on arrival if he had had the Shorter Catechism. For a moment he looked puzzled, and then replied--"I'm no sure, mem, until I ask my mither; but I ken I've had the measles."

Elsewhere, a teacher had been carefully explaining the parable of the Prodigal Son, and that done, she proceeded to put questions. All went well until near the close, when she asked, "Now, tell me who was not pleased to see the prodigal son when he came home," and to her consternation got the reply, "Please, ma'am, the fatted calf."

In a Sunday school in Ayrshire, attended chiefly by miners' children, the lesson for the day had been the parable of the ten wise and ten foolish virgins, and the teacher asked--"Can any one of you tell me why the virgins' lamps went out?" "I ken," immediately responded the dullest boy in the class; "it was the wicks that was needin' pykin'."

And the story is hoary with age of how a teacher, when the lesson had been read which bore on Jacob's dream, invited questions from the class, and how one little fellow asked--"Why did the angels need a ladder for ascending and descending when they had wings and could flee?" The teacher was nonplussed, but got out of the difficulty by saying--"Perhaps some of the other boys can answer." "I think I ken," ventured a little fellow, whose father was a bird fancier, "maybe they wad be moultin' at the time."

His solutions may be extraordinary, but nothing, you see, can baffle the young wit. It was again in a Sunday school that a teacher had been instructing a class in the relative positions of man and the lower animals in the scale of intelligence, and wishing to test how the lesson had been imbibed, she asked--"Now, what is next to man?" and got the answer promptly--"His shirt."

"What is meant by a 'hireling'?" was asked of a class in a day-school. "You are a hireling," responded a little fellow; "you are hired to teach us."

Giving a reading lesson to his class in the presence of an inspector, a teacher asked his boys what was meant by conscience--a word that had occurred in the course of the reading--and the class having been duly crammed for the occasion answered as one boy--"An inward monitor." "But what do you understand by an inward monitor?" put in the inspector. To this further question, only one boy announced himself ready to respond, and his triumphantly given answer was--"A hironclad, sir."

Their definitions are at all times interesting, if not constantly reliable. After a reading of Gray's "Elegy" by a fourth standard class, the boys were asked what was meant by "fretted vaults," and one youth replied--"The vaults in which these poor people were buried; their friends came and fretted over them." Asked what he understood by "Elegy," another boy in the same class answered--"Elegy is some poetry wrote out for schools to learn, like Gray's 'Elegy.'"