Chapter VI: Part 6

We said "good-bye," and I hoped that the Doctor and Missis Dunstan and the gurl Dunstans would have a good time; and the Doctor thanked me and said he was glad I had the grace to make that wish; and after he had gone, Morris said that he very nearly said "God bless you" to the Doctor, but staid just in time. And I said it was jolly lucky he had, for it certainly would have been friteful cheek to do it.

Then two cabs rolled away with the Doctor and his luggage and his family, and me and Morris were left. We found what 'comissariat' ment at dinner, and I will say that the food was magnificent, and the Matron was a brick all through the holidays--very diffrent to what she is in term time; and she told us a lot about her private life, which turned out that she was a widow Matron with a son. And Morris said "Why don't you bring your son here, Matron?" And I said "Of corse, why don't you?" And Morris said "It would hurt the Doctor's fealings a good deal if he knew you had a son being educated somewhere else." And she said it was all right and the Doctor was as kind as any man could be, and that the son was working hard and was a very good son, being an office-boy in a lawer's office in London.

Then came the qwarry and my temptashun of Morris, which ended in Morris going to the qwarry.

The qwarry was certainly out of bounds, and it was when out of bounds in secret with Freckles and other big chaps that I found all the wonders of it. It was a stone qwarry in Merivale Grate Wood, and there were game preserves near by, where Freckles hunted and practiced to be a bush-ranger when he went home to Australia. But of course Morris had never seen the place, because he never went out of bounds at all, from fear and also from goodness, but cheefly from fear.

I said to Morris on a fine day in the middle of August--

"Have you got any draggon-flies in your collectshun?"

And he said--

"There are no draggon-flies in Merivale."

And I said--

"You're a liar."

And he said--

"Well, anyway, I never saw one."

And I said--

"In the old qwarry in Merivale Grate Wood there are billions."

And he said--

"They can't live without water to cool their tails."

And I said--

"Any fool knows that. There's a stream and a pond in the qwarry and the draggon-flies and blackberries and butterflies, including peacocks and red admirals, are all as common as dirt."

"It's a friteful pity it's out of bounds," said Morris to me, and I explained that, though out of bounds in term time, yet, owing to the Doctor's speshul words to us before he went on his holiday, every thing was free now.

Then Morris said--

"He put us on our honour."

And I said--

"I've got just as much honour as you for that matter. But my honour covers the hole of Merivale Grate Wood, and if your honour doesn't do the same, you'll loose the draggon-flies."

Morris thought over this a good deal.

At last he said--

"There's no doubt that Slade and probably Thompson minor will get draggon-flies in their collectshuns, owing to their living by swamps and rivers."

And I said--

"Do what you like, only it happens I'm going to the qwarry to-morrow for the hole day, and Matron is going to make me sandwiches to take."

"If you honestly think it is an honourable thing to do----" said Morris.

"I honestly do think so," I said.

"I believe you're right," he said. Then rather a footling idea struck him.

"How would it be if we wrote a polite letter to the Doctor?" he asked.

"Not me," I said. "You may be sure that the Doctor, in his hard-eerned vocation, doesn't want polite letters from me or even you. In fact, it might so much anoy him that he might change his mind all together and not put us on our honour at all, but merely say we were to keep bounds, which would be deth to me. Not that I should do it in any case."

So after a lot more rot and jaw about his blessed honour, Morris came, and the day was jolly fine to begin with, and we went well armed for sport in genral. He had his butterfly-net and killing-bottle--a beestly thing full of cemicals but merciful in its way, becorse when you put a butterfly in and shut down the cork the butterfly becomes unconshus without pane and dies pretty cumfortably. All the same, as Morris said to me while we watched a lesser tortussshell passing away, "deth is deth," and the killing bottle was the only part of natural history he did not care about. Before we got to the qwarry he was wondering if the cemicals in the bottle would be strong enough for a draggon-fly.

I said--

"You've got to jolly well catch them first."

I had the sandwiches and a sling made of lether, which hurls a stone friteful distances. I had also got in secresy a packet of 'Windsor Pearl' cigarets and a box of matches. These I did not intend to show to Morris, because it wood have upset his honour again; but I had been a smoaker for years, having been tought by Steggles, and it seemed to me if I couldn't have a cigaret in the summer holidays now and then, I might as well give up smoaking all together.

There were tongue sandwiches, and bread and butter ones, and two hard-boiled eggs each, and two large lumps of carraway seed cake. It seemed a good deel to carry and yet not much to eat. I also took an india-rubber cup for water; but Morris said the water in the qwarry was no doubt where the draggon-flies lived in the first stages of their careers, and he douted if we could drink it with safety. He littel nue that he would soon drink it whether it was safe or not.

There was only one way into the qwarry and that was down a very steep and dangerous place. The opening into the qwarry was all filled up and there were raillings all round it to keep anybody from falling into it by night. Morris funked getting down for some time; then a draggon-fly actually sored past and so much excited him that he said he was reddy if I went first. I told him to see exactly what I did and then I went down. At one spot the dissent was very perilous owing to a huge stone that stuck out in the middle of the cliff. You had to curl over it and feal with your feet for a tree-root below, then, for one grate moment, you had to let go with your hands and cluch at a pointed stone on the right hand side. This stone was allways loose and wanted very delicate handling. To me, with years of practice, it was eesy; but I fealt sure it would be a bit of a twister for Morris.

He lowered down his killing-bottle and net and caterpillar-box, then he began to slowly dissend. But at the critikal moment he stretched for the pointed stone before he had got his foot on the root and all his wait came on the stone with the terrible result that the stone gave way. And when the big stone gave way, about a million other stones gave way also, so that Morris fell to the ground in an avvalanch of stones and the woods resounded with the sound. My first thort was keepers and my second thort was Morris.

He was alive and hardly hurt at all more than a spraned ankle. He went very white and sat down and shivered and felt his bones and limbs one by one. He said it was his first great escape from deth.

And I said--

"You may not have escaped all the same, becorse you've pulled down the cliff in your dissent, and that was the only way out of the qwarry, and now there isn't any way out at all!"

Which was perfectly true and not said to friten Morris. Getting out of the qwarry was far far worse than getting in and wanted a nerve of iron, which I hadn't mentioned to Morris till I got him safely in; but now he'd pulled down the place compleatly and left a naked precipice, and my nerve of iron was no good. In fact we were evidently going to have a grate adventure, and so I told Morris.

It certainly spoilt the day for him, becorse you can't very well have a ripping good picknick if you don't know how the picknick is going to end.

"It's a fine place for natural history no doubt," he said; "but we can't pretend we're going to have a good time now."

"We're going to have a long time anyway," I said.

He smiled in rather a gastlie way and said he hoped not, becorse the weather was changeing and it might rain later on.

Then I told him that wether didn't matter as there was a pretty dry cave where Freckles used to do his cooking of rabbits on half-holidays. Morris seemed glad about the cave. He rubbed his ankle and said, so far as that went, he fealt pretty right. Presently he said--

"There are certainly red admirals here in grate quantities and also draggon-flies, but somehow I don't feel I've got the heart to kill annything for the moment, espeshully after what I've just eskaped myself. Deth is deth."

"You'll be better after food," I said.

But he wouldn't hear of food.

"We must face the possishun," he said. "Here we are in a qwarry and we can't get out."

"Yes," I said.

"Very well. Then, there being no food in the qwarry except what we have brort with us, we shall soon be hungry."

"Yes," I said. "I am now."

Morris went on trying to be calm, but I could see the more he explained the situashun the more fritened he got. His voice shook when he said the next thing.

"You can't go on being hungry for more than a certain time. After you reech a certain pich, you die."

"Yes," I said.

"Well, there you are," he said.

He figetted about with his killing-bottle and things, then made a hopeless sort of a sound like an engine letting off steem.

"We must consider meens of eskape," I said. "People come here sometimes, no doubt.

"Only boys out of bounds," said Morris faintly. "Oh, what would I give to see the face of Freckles peep over the top!"

"It's impossible," I told him. "Freckles is spending the holidays with some cousins in Norfolkshire. But there are often keepers in the woods to look after the game."

"Then we must shout at intervals, night and day--as long as we've got the strength to do it, said Morris.

"Before each shout we will eat a sandwich to increese our strength," I said. But Morris fancied half a sandwich would be safer.

I thort it wasn't much good beginning by starving ourselves. In adventures nobody begins by starving--they end like that; but Morris, who has a watch, looked at it and said the time was only half-past ten and that, even if we were safe and within reach of food, we should not eat any for two hours and a half. But I said planely I could not waite that time and it ended by our dividing the food into two heaps of exactly the same size to a crumb. And I eat a sandwich boldly and fearlessly, but Morris shook his head and said it was foolhardy.

He took a very hopeless view from the first, and even thort that perhaps, when my food was all gone and his hardly begun, I should turn on him with the feerceness of starvashun and tare his food away from him. But I said, "No, Morris. What ever tortures I may suffer, I am a gentleman, and I would rather die a hundred times than take as much as one seed out of your peece of cake."

This comforted him rather. He put his hand on his chin and stared before him in a very feeble manner.

"Deth is deth," he began again.

"That's the third time you've said that," I told him, "and if you say it once more, I'll punch your head. Now, I'm going to utter the first grate shout, and I hope it may bring a keeper--not Thomas or Waxy West, for they are both very hard and beestly men, and very likely wouldn't rescue us even if they new we were here; but the under-keeper, Masters. He will certainly save us, and if he does, I'll give him my packet of cigarets."

I shouted six times; then I shouted six more times; then I told Morris to have a shot. But he made such a piffling, feeble squeak that you could hardly have heard him a quarter of a mile off.

"Lucky I can howl," I said, "or we should both be done for without a dout. Why, a lamb that has lost its mother would get up more row than that."

Morris was rather hurt at this. Me explained that he was making an Australian sound tought him by Freckles.

"It may not be loud," he said, "but it is a well-none sound in Australia and travel grate distances espeshully over water."

The menshun of water made us go and look at the pond. I was fritefully thirsty by now and drank some. It was grey in colour but clear when seen in my india-rubber cup and quite holesome to the taste. Morris douted, but still he drank. I advised him to catch some draggon-flies and he said he would after the next time for shouting had come. We arranged that I should shout every half-hour, and Morris wanted to give me one sandwich from his store as payment for the exershun of shouting; but I skorned it and told him I would not think of doing so.

After the second shouting, which did nothing, used my sling a bit and neerly hit a bird, and Morris cought a draggon-fly and let it go out of pitty, and then he cought another and kept it to see if the killing-bottle would kill it. It did. After about half a minute in the bottle the draggon was gone, and we shook him out and examined his butiful markings of yellow and black and his transparent wings, that had the colours of the rainbow on them when the sun fell on them in a particular manner.

Morris stroaked it in a sorroful way.

"It is out of its missery now. I wish me and you were," he said.

I said we hadn't begun our missery yet. I advised him to eat a sandwich and he did, but very reluctantly.

He said that water would keep life in the human frame for many weeks. He also said that he fealt, in a damp place like this, we might eesily get pewmonia. He wondered if I hadn't better shout every quarter of an hour. He also thort his watch was going far too slow owing to his fall down the side of the qwarry. The sun had gone behind some rather dark clouds and we couldn't be sure where it was.

The only thing that happened during the next hour was that the draggon-fly came to again, not being ded but merely incensible. It lifted a paw rather feebly to its forehead and evvidently had a headacke. Then it took a step or two and shivered a lot. Somehow it grately cheered Morris the draggon-fly recovering. He sed it had come out of the jaws of deth and so perhaps we should. He gave it an atom of tongue out of a sandwich, but it was not up to eating, and turned away from it. Then Morris got it some water to wet its glittering tail. This certainly refreshed it and so Morris dashed a few drops on its head which refreshed it still more. At half-past two it rose and flew several inches and at three it disappeered.

By this time I had eaten all my sandwiches and drunk tons of water and was pealing my first hard-boiled egg.

Suddenly Morris had an idea. He had only eaten one sandwich and was of course famishing with hunger. He said--

"If you was to write a message and tie it round a stone and sling it into space, it might be found and red. Then a resque party would be arranged and we should be saved."

It was pretty good for Morris, and I took out my pocket-book instantly and wrote three messages. And he wrote three. He sed it was like men on sinking ships, who send off messages in bottles that are found many years afterwards in Iceland. And I said it was. Of corse we hoped one at leest of the six messages might be found pretty soon. Years afterwards was no good to us.

I merely wrote--

"Lost in Grate Wood Qwarry and unable to get out. Arnold Foster. Come at once."

And Morris wrote--

"At the point of deth in Grate Wood Qwarry. No eskape. Food neerly done. A handsome reward will be given. William Arkwright Henderson Morris."

I asked him how he nue a handsome reward would be given, and he said he didn't, but that he felt it was a safe thing to say and might make all the diffrence to anybody finding the message. Then I shot off the six messages rapped round stones, and they eesily flew over the edge of the qwarry. I then shouted again and eat my first egg.

Just when it began to rain Morris had another grate idea. He said--

"Didn't you say something about a packet of cigarets some time ago?"

And I said--

"Yes, and I am glad you reminded me about them, becorse I just feal that one will do me a lot of good."

Then I pulled them out and opened the packet and took one and lit it.

"It is very restful in such an adventure as this," I told Morris.

Then he explained his idear. It is well none that when you are learning to smoak, your appetite is often spoilt for a time. Now Morris thort that if he smoaked, he would not want food, and so much valuable food might be saved, and life prolonged if necessary.

He said--

"To you, who smoak so eesily, no dout it is no good, but I have never smoaked, and if I took a cigaret and went through with it, it might turn me off eating for some time."

This was true, but I pointed out a grate danger that Morris had forgotten.

"That is all right and I will of corse share my cigarets with you, and as there are twenty, that will be ten each," I said; "but I must seeriously warn you, Morris, that to a perfect beginer, like you, many things might happen besides merely a fealing against tongue sandwiches. You might be absolutely sick and then----"

"All the food in me would be wasted," said Morris in a very tragick tone.

He turned quite white at this idea. He said it would be madness to do anything to weaken his system at such a critikal time, and I said so too. Then he asked me to go and smoak further off, because the very smell made him feal rather strange after what I had told him.

I smoaked three cigarets bang off and they only made me hungrier than ever. Then the rain became rather bad and at four o'clock we entered the cavern. At least I did, but Morris stood at the door ready to run out and shout if by a lucky chance anybody came in sight on the edge of the qwarry. But nobody came and the next serious thing was that my voice began to get husky after so much shouting. Morris said it was the cigarets, but I told him it was owing to yelling all day every half-hour, which undoubtedly it was.

At six I went to sleep for some time in the cave and Morris did not wake me, because he said that I was gaining strength by it. When I woke it was getting darkish and I thort it would be a good thing to make a fire. Morris thort so too and we made one reddy with a lot of ded fern that Freckles had put long ago into the cavern. We took the paper that had rapped up our lunch, and put it under the fern, and covered it with my coat to keep it dry; and after dark we lighted it, and it made a good blaze for a minute but unfortunately went out owing to the rain.

The rain, in fact, began to pour steddily and it was a partickularly dark evening. Morris became a simple worm after dark. He took a small bite out of a sandwich and said his prayers from end to end every half-hour. I had only got my cake left now, and it seemed to me better to have one good meel and have done with it than keep messing about like Morris was. So I finished my cake and tried to go to sleep again.

We found that water came through the roof of the cavern in rather large quantities, and Morris had a new terror. He said--

"If we can't get out of the qwarry, then I don't see how water can get out, and so, if it rains more than a certain amount, the qwarry will get full and we shall be drowned."

Which showed what a footling state of mind Morris had got into.

Presently I sneezed and he said of corse that it was the beginning of pewmonia. Then he asked for a match to see the time and it was six minutes past ten. Then I shouted again at the cavern entrance without result.

He kept on asking for matches to see the time until there were only five left, and I said we must keep these for immergencies, and he said he supposed we must.

At last he went into a sort of sleep after shedding some teers and pretending it was a cold in his head. Then I lighted a cigaret and found much to my supprise that I was beginning to feal queer myself with a new sort of queerness quite new to me.

I woke Morris and told him that I was sorry to say I was ill; and he said he was undoubtedly very ill too and had been dreeming of his mother, which he only did when frightfully ill. He also asked me if I believed in ghosts and I said I thort I did. And he said he always did.

There were some awfully strange noises happening outside at this time, and I sakrificed another match and found it was neerly one o'clock. Then we went to the mouth of the cavern and listened to a peculiar creepy sound far off. The rain had stopped and a sloppy looking moon was coming up. Morris shivered.

"That might be the mournful yell of some wretched ghost," he said.

"It's owels," I said, but he did not think so. He thort it was too miserable for owels.

It came neerer and certainly was not owels.

Then a thort struck me.

"It's a resque party!" I said.

We shouted with all our might and screamed and yelled, and presently there was an ansering yell and we fealt that with any luck we were now saved. Soon toarches gleemed through the trees, and there were sounds of human feet and langwidge.

I said to Morris--

"We are now saved, Morris, and if you are not going to eat your piece of carraway seed cake, I should very much like to."

And he said--

"You can eat everything. I have such a fealing of thankfulness to be saved, that I couldn't eat for the moment, empty as I am. Besides there will be supper provided."

A man shouted above us and I heard the hated voice of Waxy West.

"Be you little devils down there?" he cried out.

"Yes, we are, Mr West," I answered him very loud. "We're doing no harm at all--merely waiting quietly to be resqued. We only came for draggon-flies, and the side of the qwarry gave way unfortunately, or we shouldn't have had to trouble you at such a late hour."

He growled in rather an unkind tone of voice, and we saw there were two other men with him. Then they began to make arrangements for the resque and one was told to go and get a rope.

"If ever I catch you in this place again, I'll break both your necks," said Waxy West; and though this was rather strong, it comforted Morris in a way, becorse it showed that West hadn't found his messages offering a handsome reward. If there had been any question of that, he would have been polite and kringeing; but he was just as usual.

We found out, after, that Matron had got in a funk and gone to the big house, where the people belonging to Merivale Grate Wood live; and the people had sent their keepers in all directions to save us.

These keepers got a rope and made knots in it and lowered it down, and told us that we must climb up it. And I let Morris go first, which he did; and then I went up, and the keepers saw us home.

I told Waxy West that I should mention the subject to my parints in India and that I hoped they might send at least a pound to him, and he said it wasn't likely, becorse he'd done them the worst turn any man could. And he said that if I wanted to reward him, I would never go into Merivale Grate Wood again; and I promised I wouldn't go in again for a full month. Which he evvidently didn't believe.

There was fritefully good tuck waiting for us at school, and the Matron, who had been blubbing, said a grate many rather unkind things while we eat it. But she promised not to tell Dr Dunstan and he does not no even to this day.

Morris didn't win the holiday competishun becorse, as he expected, both Slade and Thompson minor brort back draggon-flies. We might eesily have gone to the qwarry again, after the month I promised Waxy West was over, but nothing would tempt Morris to go, though I bought ten yards of good rope for my own use. However, he paid me sixpence for getting him back his killing-bottle and his butterfly-net and his caterpillar-box, which were forgot in the excitement of the resque; and that was all to the good.

*RICHMOND AND THE MAJOR-GENERAL*

*No. X*

*RICHMOND AND THE MAJOR-GENERAL*

The fellows talk such a lot of absolute piffle about what I did, and tell such a frightful number of regular right down lies about it, that I have decided to write out the whole thing myself from the beginning, that the truth shall be known. There is nothing like truth really, and it is the only thing that lasts, and I am going to tell the truth fearlessly, because honesty is the best policy, however hard it may be at the time.

Well, after I gave up preaching to the chaps at Merivale, owing to the row about Browne and Stopford and all the unpleasantness afterwards, I felt that my occupation was gone in a sort of way; and it so weighed on my mind that I was one of the first to get German measles and one of the last to recover. I was shut up in the hospital and had a great deal of time on my hands for thought, and the more I thought, the more I felt that my preaching gift ought not to be wasted like this. I tried preaching to myself once or twice, to keep my hand in, and I found that I was clean out of practice and couldn't work up to "thirdly and lastly" without getting regularly tied in a knot. Then I tried to preach to the matron, and she said it was morbid and told the doctor (for I heard her through the door) that I was very low and taking a most unhealthy interest in religion. After which I had a lot more most uncalled for and beastly medicine, and was isolated for three more days; because the doctor said it might be something else threatening. What was threatening really was my conscience. I was perfectly well and frightfully eager to be doing good in the world; and as it seemed simply useless to try to do any more good at Merivale, chiefly owing to that son of Belial called Stopford, I came to the terrific resolve of going. I decided to leave quietly. I thought on the last day of being isolated I would steal out into the world in a spirit of calm courage, and try to do good, and leave the rest to Providence.

I did nothing rashly, because it is well known that Heaven helps those who help themselves, and we must not throw all the burden on Providence, however much inclined we may feel to do so. We are given our talents to use, not to put under a bushel. I had ten shillings and a telescope, worth eight-and-six. I had nothing else but my volume of Skeleton Sermons. It seemed enough.

One is bound to be worldly-wise up to a certain point; and this is right and proper. If you have a mission, you must use the best means for carrying it out, and even money may be put to very proper purposes if it is spent with a high object. Besides, the labourer is worthy of his hire.

With my money I determined to use artificial means for getting as far from Merivale as possible. For ten shillings you can go an immense distance by train, though a half-ticket was no longer possible for me, as I was over twelve; but a train is far too public and I should have been discovered. Therefore I decided upon the simple plan of hiring a bicycle. The time was May and the evenings were long. Therefore I determined to hire the bicycle during the hour when everybody would be in chapel for evening prayer. Being isolated I could do this.

The eventful night was fine and warm. I slipped out unperceived, but I had taken the precaution not to wear my hat with the school colours, as that would have been instantly observed. So I went to my private box and took out my round bowler hat, which could not lead to detection. I then got over the hedge into the main road, because to have walked out of the gate by the lodge would have much decreased my chances of escape.

All went well. The people at the bicycle shop raised no difficulty, and for five shillings they let me have a machine for two hours--also matches to light the lamp. It was put into their minds to trust me, and I saw from the first that Providence was going to help me. The man even shortened the steps a little as I am unusually stumpy in the legs.

I gave him five shillings and set off. Pursuit would not begin till my supper was brought by the matron, and I had a clear hour before that time. Then I knew what would happen; because two terms before, young Watkinson, who was homesick, had run away and tried to walk from Merivale, in Devonshire, to Edinburgh, where his grandmother lives; but he had been taken by Mannering riding that way on his bicycle, two miles out of Merivale. So I knew that the masters on bicycles and policemen on foot would soon be after me, and I intended to avoid the main roads and spend the night in some harmless and wholesome cowhouse on a bed of sweet meadow hay. Then in the morning I should rise, get a drink of milk and a little bread-and-butter from some simple and kind-hearted housewife, and leave the bicycle with her to be returned by train to the bicycle shop at Merivale. What would happen after that I left entirely to Providence.

A telescope and a rather fat book are awkward things on a bicycle, and they bumped me rather heavily, one on each side, as I started. So after riding a few miles I dismounted, slung the telescope over my back and buttoned the Skeleton Sermons to my chest. Though not comfortable, they did not bump, and I went steadily on my way. At a quarter to nine I lighted my lamp and well knew that Mannering and Chambers had started, and that many telegrams, including one to my father, had probably been sent off by Dr. Dunstan from Merivale. For the first time I considered what view my father would take of my action, and I was bound to feel that he might not care much about it. My father, though a good father to me, has never trusted as much in Providence as I could have wished; which is curious, seeing that he is not only a clergyman but also a rural dean. He wants me to go into some lucrative business, but I never will, for I have no feeling for it. My father thinks that money is everything, and I know well it is not. He said to me once that you can always tell a gentleman by his neckties and the cigars he smokes. Which is childish, because many perfect gentlemen never smoke cigars at all.

I got rather depressed after dark--entirely owing to thinking about my father. I also got strangely hungry and was beginning to wonder whether I had better try for some supper anywhere, or just leave nature to settle that. Then a most serious and unforeseen thing happened and the hind tyre of the bicycle went off with a loud explosion, like a pistol. I dismounted instantly. I kept my nerve and quietly considered the situation. For a moment it looked as if Providence was against me, but I could not be sure of this yet. I wheeled the bicycle to a gate and sat on the gate and considered. Then, far down the road I had come, I saw a light and instantly perceived that another bicycle was approaching at quite twenty miles an hour. To drag my bicycle through the gate into the field, to shut the gate, extinguish the lamp, and crouch in the hedge motionless and silent, was the work of an instant. The bicycle flew past and the man on it grunted with little grunts. It was, in fact, the well-known grunt of Mannering--a sound he always makes at footer and hockey. So I saw that Providence was still with me and felt very much cheered; because, if the lyre had not burst, I should have been quietly riding along not thinking of Mannering, and he would have overtaken me and all would have been over.

My resolutions were soon made. I left the main road, which was evidently now no place for me, and wheeled the bicycle down a lane near a farm. I felt that it would be necessary to my health to eat something before sleeping, but cared little what it was, and decided that I would just take the fruits of the earth--corn or a few turnips, or anything. In the morning I should mention it to the farmer's wife and ask her to change my five-shilling piece. For the change from my ten-shilling piece, after paying for the bicycle hire, was a five-shilling piece.

I now became conscious of the fact that the bicycle was a hindrance rather than a help. To leave it behind was, therefore, the work of a moment. But first I took a leaf out of my pocketbook and wrote on it these words--

"_Kindly return this bicycle to the shop of Messrs. Jones and Garratt, bicycle works, Merivale, and all will be well. The hind wheel is punctured. The finder will probably be rewarded._"

To show, however, that I was not careless for the bicycle, I may say that I went on till I found a cowshed, so that the machine might be dry and not suffer from night dew or possible rain. It was not the sort of cowshed that I meant to sleep in myself, being evidently used purely for cows, and having no fragrant, clean hay or anything of the kind in it; but it was good enough for the bicycle; so I left it there and went on my way.

There are very peculiar and creepy sounds to be heard in the country at night, and I heard them all. Everything, in fact, is quite different to what it is by day. Especially the colours of things. There was a watery sort of moon, and it made all the leaves on the trees look as if they were cut out of dirty white paper. And it made gate-posts and tree-stems look as if they were alive. I got a curious sort of feeling about this time and lit a match and read a couple of Skeleton Sermons. This put me absolutely all right, and I went to seek some of the fruits of the earth. But May is evidently a bad time for that purpose. In fact, there were simply no fruits of the earth to eat anywhere, so I had to trust to young leaves. Beech leaves are all right in a way, but you soon have enough. That was all I could get, however, and I washed them down with a drink from a brook, but unluckily slipped in while filling my bowler hat with water. Then the thing was to find a comfortable place with sweet, snug straw; and I crept down to a farmhouse; and, hearing me creeping down unfortunately upset a dog so much that it barked steadily for half-an-hour and woke many other dogs for miles round.

At last I found a poorish sort of shed which had no sweet, fragrant hay but only a cart with sacks in it. The sacks had been used for guano. Still they were better than nothing, and I got into the cart and pulled the sacks over me, having first taken off my socks and hung them on the edge of the cart to dry. I slept, but not well, and when morning came I found myself deeply scented with guano and starving for food, but otherwise all right and still free. So I read a bit, and put on my socks, and set out boldly down a lane to the farm. But, after all, I did not go to this particular farm, because, instead of a motherly woman or some beautiful young girl standing at the door feeding chickens and pigeons, there were two men in a corner killing a pig, and the pig simply hated it; and to see this done on an empty stomach is very trying to the nerves. So I went hastily and boldly on, and at last found a quiet and humble cottage and a woman in it. I don't think she would have given me food for nothing; but when I said I would pay her a shilling for a breakfast, and showed her my five shillings to prove it, she met my views gladly and gave me three pieces of bread-and-butter, an egg, that was not laid yesterday, and some tea. Then she changed the five-shilling piece and gave me back four shillings.

Much refreshed and with nothing to trouble me but a cold in the head, doubtless owing to getting my feet wet, I went on my way. My idea was to get to Exeter and then boldly take my stand in the cathedral yard and try to begin doing good and arresting the careless passer-by, and leaving the rest to Providence. I did not know whether it might be possible to get to Exeter by lanes and footpaths over fields. Nothing happened except that I gave away two shillings in charity to a blind woman with four children. I also said a few encouraging words to her. And then, being now in the middle of a very lonely common covered with yellow gorse and white may, I came suddenly upon a man sitting under a bush smoking a cigarette. He was evidently not a happy man, being very ragged and with one laced boot and one elastic one. His hair was long, partly yellow and partly grey; his face was as brown as leather; and he had little rings in his ears. His clothes were faded and a good deal patched. He evidently did not mind what he wore. His eyes were blue and bright, but rather kind on the whole. There was a paper opened beside him. It was a bit of newspaper and contained bones and the sort of food you give to dogs. His nails were long and black, and some of his fingers perfectly yellow from smoking cigarettes.

I said--

"Good-morning! Can you kindly tell me the distance to Exeter?"

And he said--

"I'm going there myself after I've finished my breakfast. It's about ten miles from here."

I thought very likely that Providence had thrown this rather unsuccessful man into my path for a good purpose; so I said--

"As we are both going to Exeter, we might perhaps walk part of the way together. Only I like the quiet lanes and field-paths best--not the high road."

He seemed to think the idea quite possible. He said--

"Can't be too quiet for me."

I said--

"I cannot tell you my history, but I may tell you this much: I am quite determined to do some good in the world."

He said--

"Funny you should say that. I'm just the same. I'm nuts on doing some good myself. In fact, I was sitting here this minute wondering what the dickens it should be."

I said--

"The truest way to make yourself happy is to set to work to make other people happy."

And he said--

"Righto! I've always stuck to that. And I've been so busy lately, trying to make other people cheerful, that I've got rather down on my own luck."

He offered me the remains of his repast, which I declined. Then I told him that I had two shillings and that, if he was still hungry, he might share my lunch with me when we came to some quiet inn. He thanked me heartily and fell in with this. He said he wasn't hungry but was suffering from an agonizing thirst. He said that thirst was a disease with him, also smoking; and I told him that it was a terrible mistake to become the victim of a habit; and he said he knew only too well that it was.

I improved his mind a good deal before we came to an inn, and then, not wishing to be seen, I gave him one of my shillings and told him to spend sixpence on himself and sixpence on me. I merely wanted sixpennyworth of good, wholesome bread-and-cheese; and I went behind some haystacks and waited for him.

He was a long time coming, and, when he did come, I was surprised to find how little bread-and-cheese he brought for sixpence. Me admitted frankly that it was very little; but he said the landlord was a hard man and he would not give a crumb more for the money.

While I ate, Marmaduke FitzClarence Beresford--for that was this friend's name--told me something of his life. He was a gentleman by birth and also by education. He had, in fact, been to Eton and Oxford and also in the army. He had won the Victoria Cross and been mentioned several times in dispatches. He had even shaken hands with the King and been thanked by the House of Commons for his services in the Boer War. But then, at the very height of his worldly prosperity, a bank had broken and he had suddenly found himself quite ruined and penniless. Of course he had to leave the army, for in the position he had now reached, which was that of major-general, his mess bill alone ran into gold every week. A major-general has to buy champagne every day of his life, whether he drinks it or not. It is a rule in the British army and very important. But he said that nothing mattered as long as one tried to do good in the condition in life that one found oneself in. He said I was perfectly right to carry my Skeleton Sermons with me, and that the first thing he was going to do, when he had saved a little money, was to buy a volume himself. But, if anything, he was still more interested in my telescope. He said that it was good for five shillings and advised me to sell it. He explained that it was useless to me if I was going to devote the rest of my life to doing good; and of course this was true.

He said we had better stop where we were till dusk, and that there was a small town, two miles off, where it might be possible for him, as a favour to me, to get a friend of his to buy the telescope. So we sat a good many hours in this quiet field; and he smoked thousands of cigarettes, and I told him many things that it was useful for him to know; and he told me many things that it was not particularly useful for me to know, yet interesting. He was a well-meaning and religious officer, but he was rather soured, naturally enough, owing to the utter breaking of his bank and the loss of his hard-earned savings.

He admitted that I had made him see several things in a very new and different light, and then, towards evening, he said we might now start to sell the telescope. He said with a part of the proceeds I might get a fairly clean bed at the little town, and that he hoped, after a comfortable night's rest, I should be able to start refreshed and strong to do good at Exeter. I asked him where he was going to sleep, and he said in some ditch, because, for the moment, he was absolutely without means, having given away his last shilling to a poor tramp who was even worse off than himself. I told him he might be very sure that he would never regret that shilling; and he said probably not in the long run, but, just for the moment, as it was going to be a wet night and he had a bad cold on his chest developing into bronchitis, he felt a little weak and regretful. Then I said--

"You shall share this telescope with me, Major-general Beresford, and if you like to throw in your lot with me, we will take a humble lodging for the night and start to do good to-morrow."

He said it was almost more than he had a right to expect; and yet it showed how wicked he had been to doubt Providence for a moment. He almost cried, and I cheered him up and told him to be courageous and hopeful. Then he said he would try to be; and then he went off with the telescope, while I waited just outside the small town behind a hoarding. The major-general had said that he should be about an hour, as a thing of this kind wanted a good deal of doing; but he wasn't: he came back in twenty minutes, and he brought the telescope with him, and he was in a frightful rage and spoke several soldierly words that were not at all right to use for a man who wanted to do good.

Me said--

"The blighters won't let me pop it! They all want to know how I came by it! Dash their infernal impudence! Why, they'd have had the cops on me if I'd stopped to argue about it! You'd better take it yourself. But I'll be even with some of 'em yet, clash and bash them! I'll burn their very bad-word houses down about their ears before they're much older!"

In this dreadful way he went on for some time; then I tried to calm him down and told him he must not feel too much hurt because common, crafty men in shops regarded him suspiciously. I said--

"You evidently lost your temper with them, and that is never right or wise. It was your boots that made them doubt you. You ought quietly to have told them who you are, and about the King shaking hands with you, and the bank breaking, and so on. Then they would have understood, and if they had been Christian men, they would have sympathized with you and very likely have given six or seven shillings for the telescope."

He said, rather foolishly--

"Given six or seven grandmothers for the telescope!"

Then he seemed to grow suddenly suspicious of me and he asked--

"Where did _you_ get it from anyhow? If I thought you'd sneaked it, I'd----"

"I got it from my Uncle Horace," I said. "He is an amateur astronomer and understands the stars."

"Well, I ought to understand three balls by this time," answered the major-general, though what this meant I have never understood myself to this day.

Then he began to make me rather uncomfortable, and I detected a good deal of vulgarity in him. But doubtless it often turns people vulgar and brutal to come down in the world, owing to having to mix with their inferiors and suchlike.

Now he began to ask me about myself in a very cross-questioning manner, and at last it seemed to me that I must tell him the truth. In fact, he kept on so about who I was and where I had come from, that it got to be a simple question between telling him the truth and telling him a lie. Therefore, of course, I told him the truth, and said that my name was Richmond and that I had lately changed my way of life by leaving school in order to do some public work in the way of goodness.

He seemed much surprised.

"You've run away from school then?" he exclaimed.

"Yes," I said; "but of course I am telling you this in the strictest confidence."

He quite saw that, and said that he regarded the confidence as a great compliment to him. He became perfectly friendly again and said that, when a boy, he had run away from school also, and that most boys of spirit did so--in fact, nearly every boy who ever made much of a mark in the world began in that manner. I reminded him that he had been to Eton and Oxford, and he admitted it. It was from Eton that he had run away, but he had been subsequently captured and taken back.

"Now you have confided in me," he said, "I think I can really be of some practical use to you."

He guessed at the time and said, that if we put our best foot foremost, we ought to be in Exeter by midnight. I remember, curiously enough, wondering which was his best foot--the one in the lace-up boot, or the one with elastic sides. Anyway, we set off after I had shared my last shilling with him. This he changed into food and drink at a small public-house by the wayside.

"At Exeter," he said, "I am widely known and respected. When we get there, certain people will welcome me in a friendly spirit, and I am quite sure they will welcome you too. In fact, I can promise you a very warm welcome and a good night's rest."

"Will they take the telescope?" I asked.

"No," he said. "They are not people like that. When they understand the situation, they will be perfectly well satisfied with you as you are."

I was glad that the major-general had come back to this quieter and wiser frame of mind, and thanked him.

"I hope it may be in my power to do you a service some day," I said; and then, in his turn, he thanked me.

"You never know," he replied. "You may be able to do me a good turn even sooner than you think for."