My School-Days | Page 2

no prisoner ever hailed the falling of his fetters with the joy I felt when at last, after three or four days of headache and tears, I was wrapped in a blanket and taken home with the measles.
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When I got better we went for the midsummer holidays to a lovely cottage among the beech-woods of Buckinghamshire. I shall never forget the sense of rest and delight that filled my small heart when I slipped out under the rustic porch at five o'clock the first morning, and felt the cool velvet turf under my feet. Brighton pavement had been so hard and hot. Then, instead of the long rows of dazzling houses with their bow windows and green-painted balconies, there were lovely trees, acacias and elms, and a big copper beech. In the school walks we never had found any flowers but little pink bind-weed, by the dusty roadside. Here there were royal red roses, and jasmine, and tall white lilies, and in the hedge by the gate, sweet-brier and deep-cupped white convolvulus. I think I saw then for the first time how lovely God's good world is, and ever since then, thank God, I have been seeing it more and more. That was a happy morning.
The boys--whom I had not seen for ever so long, because of the measles--were up already. Alfred had a rabbit for me--a white rabbit with pink eyes--in a hutch he had made himself. And Harry led me to a nook among the roots of the copper beech, where he showed me two dormice in an old tea-caddy.
"You shall go shares in them if you like," he said.
There was honey in the comb for breakfast, and new-laid eggs, and my mother was there in a cool cotton gown pouring out tea, and purring with pleasure at having all her kittens together again. There were cool raspberries on the table too, trimmed with fresh green leaves, and through the window we saw the fruit garden and its promise. That was summer indeed.
After breakfast my mother called me to her--she had some patterns in her hand.
"You must be measured for some new frocks, Daisy," she said.
"Oh, how nice. What colour?"
"Well, some nice white ones, and this pretty plaid." She held up a pattern as she spoke. It was a Stuart plaid.
"Oh, not that!" I cried.
"Not this pretty plaid, darling? Why not?"
If you'll believe me, I could not say why not. And the frock was made, and I wore it, loathing it, till the day when I fell out of the apple-tree, and it broke my fall by catching on a branch. But it saved my life at the expense of its own; and I gave a feast to all the dolls to celebrate its internment in the rag-bag.
I have often wondered what it is that keeps children from telling their mothers these things--and even now I don't know. I only know I might have been saved many of these little-big troubles if I had only been able to explain. But I wasn't; and to this day my mother does not know how and why I hated that Stuart plaid frock.

PART II.
LONG DIVISION.
I SPENT a year in the select boarding establishment for young ladies and gentlemen at Stamford, and I venture to think that I should have preferred a penal settlement. Miss Fairfield, whose school it was was tall and pale and dark, and I thought her as good and beautiful as an angel. I don't know now whether she was really beautiful, but I know she was good. And her mother--dear soul--had a sympathy with small folly in disgrace, which has written her name in gold letters on my heart.
But there was another person in the house, whose name I will not put down. She came continually between me and my adored Miss Fairfield. She had a sort of influence over me which made it impossible for me ever to do anything well while she was near me. Miss Fairfield's health compelled her to leave much to Miss ----, and I was, in consequence, as gloomy a cynic as any child of my age in Lincolnshire. My chief troubles were three--my hair, my bands, and my arithmetic.
My hair was never tidy--I don't know why. Perhaps it runs in the family--for my little daughter's head is just as rough as mine used to be. This got me into continual disgrace. I am sure I tried hard enough to keep it tidy--I brushed it for fruitless hours till my little head was so sore that it hurt me to put my hat on. But it never would look smooth and shiny, like Katie Martin's, nor would it curl prettily like the red locks of Cissy Thomas. It was always a rough, impossible brown mop. I got into a