Chapter VII: Hurrah for the Holidays!

And yet, however pleasant lessons might be, there is no doubt that holidays were pleasant things, too. Saturday afternoons were always welcome, and all the weeks through we were planning what we would do when they came. Of course these plans were sometimes upset by a rainy day; but, even then, what with battledore and shuttlecock, painting and spinning tops, we contrived to make out the time very happily.

And before us all the while was the bright, pleasant prospect of the long summer holidays.

Every now and then during these happy months the thought of home came across me, and sometimes one of mamma's letters would have in it so much about Bobby and his play, and his prattle about Sissy's coming back, that I grew a little home-sick and looked wistfully into grandmamma's face as she read the letter. This would always make her say: "You don't want to go home, little one? Aren't you very happy here with Lottie and the boys? And you are getting on so nicely with your books, too; mamma is so pleased to have you with so many little schoolfellows, and kind Miss Grant to teach you! And we are going to have all kinds of pleasant treats in the holidays. No, no, we must keep you another month or two! Perhaps we will send you home when the cold weather comes!" So I ran away again to make plans with Lottie about all the many things that must be done the very first day of no lessons.

Then came the last time of history, and the last dreadful sums, and the last copy written, and the last hard French words learnt, and then, happiest of all, the last putting away of books and cleaning of slates! It almost makes me take that long breath for joy even now only to remember that happy day.

"And don't you think I'm the happiest of us all?" said Miss Grant; "I am the only one really going home for the holidays!"

Which remark was a great relief to my little mind, for I had been afraid we must seem a great deal too glad that she was going. Now I could venture on my very loudest "hurrah," which, after all, was but a feeble imitation of the boys' loud cheers.

You know, anticipation is the best part of every pleasure; in easier words, everything looks brighter before it comes than when it _is_ come. I think that was very nearly the happiest day of my whole year at Beecham, when I sat on the floor watching the last things put into Miss Grant's box, and chattering away about the happy days coming. You see, for a long time I had got up every morning with the thought of how many good marks I should get, and of how those hard letters and figures were to be made, and though I had made many a brave fight and won many a delightful victory over the books, yet it _was_ very nice to think that to-morrow I should awake with the holiday feeling instead.

And the next morning did really come, though we thought it never would, and we made a very long meal of breakfast, being not quite sure what was to come next.

It was a funny day, that first day! Grandmamma and Uncle Hugh went away early for a long drive, and all sorts of business at the end of it; and we knew they would not be home till ever so late. It was very hot--oh, so _very_ hot! We could not go into the sun at all, but Susette and Jane sent us out of the nursery very soon, that we might not disturb baby's midday sleep by our holiday fun. The school-room, of course, we avoided; so, after a little hesitation, we went out into the shade to play.

And, first of all, we thought of the swing as the best thing to be done, and for half an hour it _was_ most delightful! Don't you know the pleasant feeling it is, just up at the very highest point, when you are not _quite_ sure whether you are frightened or not? Don't you know? And you laugh a little anxiously, and are very glad to find yourself safely down again. Oh, it was very good fun for _a little while_! Only Harry came to swing us, and he was so fond of seeing your feet up into the branches, that you never could be quite sure that he would not send you head-over-heels. Lottie was very brave, but I could not quite stand it, so I stood by and watched; and when they asked me to have another try, I said, "No, thank you." I think Alick saw that I was a little red and uncomfortable, for he asked me to come and play on the lawn. We ran away, taking a last look at the two elder ones. It was not such boisterous play that we had, we two together, yet I think we enjoyed it very much, half-talking, half-playing. We were very good friends, and the morning went very quickly. When the dinner-bell rang, we agreed that we would start off together as soon as we could for the apple-orchard at the top of the hill, where we were not likely to be disturbed.

That hot July afternoon, how well I remember it! All among the long grass we lay, looking up at the little, young apples overhead, and now and then setting our teeth in the sour middles of those that had fallen. But we were a little afraid of the effects of these unripe, bullet things, so we did no more than taste them. Then my eight-year-old cousin began to say me long pages of poetry, and when he had exhausted his stores, he astonished me by the funny, learned sound of his Latin declensions.

"You know, Sissy," he said, "I mean to be a very learned man some day, and know twelve or fourteen languages, I think. I shall not be content till I know more than anybody else. It will be nice to be wiser than papa. He's ever so clever, you see; but then, of course, new things will be found out every year, and sons must always get a-head of their fathers, or else the world would stand still, you see."

I didn't quite see, but I pretended to. Alick had been very confidential lately, and I knew what a sore spot there was in his heart making him talk like this. Hadn't he confided to me with a fierce, red heat on his forehead how his father had told him he wasn't "half a boy," because he had turned giddy climbing a high tree? "But papa always says when Harry bangs his head about, that he doesn't believe there can be any brains behind such a skull as his. I dare say that is the difference between us."

So said the young scholar with all the satisfaction possible, and I believed in him with all my heart.

However, even he grew tired of wise talk, and proposed a game with the fallen apples. How we pelted each other, how we laughed, and, oh, how hot we did get at last! Then off came hats and jackets, and were left behind under the trees while we went to rest ourselves in a piece of open shade, thrown by that large barn where, by and by, the apples would be stored away; and this was the moment which I seized to get his advice as to a new toy I had lately bought to send to Bobbie. It was one of those wooden soldiers whose arms and legs are to go by means of a string; but the string, you know, is always getting hitched. This was the case now, and it tasked all Alick's wonderful brains to set it right. How my back and arm did ache as I held it up for him, lying flat on the grass, to twitch, and pull, and contrive, and, at last, to conquer! That happy moment had just come when there was a sound of wheels in the road near us. One minute more, and Uncle Hugh's voice was heard calling us, and the carriage stopped to take us up. What grand, glorious news we were told as we drove home, two hatless, jacketless, sun-burnt children, I must not tell you this time.