collections—leo's letter—nurse bundle and sir lionel
if nurse bundle hoped that when i went to school an end would be put to the "collections" which troubled her tidy mind, she was much deceived. neither leo nor i were bookworms, and we were not by any means so devoted as some boys to games and athletics. but for collections of all kinds we had a fancy that almost amounted to mania.
our natural history manias in their respective directions came upon us like fevers. we "sickened" at the sight of somebody else's collection, or because we had been reading about butterflies, or birds' eggs, or water-plants, as the case might be. when "the complaint" was "at its height," we lived only for specimens; we gave up leisure, sleep, and pocket-money to our collection; we made notes and memoranda in our grammars and lexicons that had no classical reference. we sent letters to country newspapers which never appeared, and asked questions that met with no reply. we were apt, also, to recover from these attacks, leaving nurse bundle burdened with boxes or folios of dry, dusty broken fragments of plants and insects, which we did not touch, but which she was strictly forbidden to destroy. we pur[181]sued our fancies during the holidays. i have now a letter that i got from damer after my fourth half:
"london.
"my dear regie,—
"eureka! what do you think? my poor governor collected moths. i bullied my guardian till he let me have the collection. such specimens! no end of foreign ones we know nothing about, and i am having a case made. i found a little book with his notes in. we are quite at sea to go flaring about with nets and bruising the specimens. the way is to dig for chrysalises. mind you do; and how i envy you! for i have to be in this horrid town, when i long to be grubbing at the roots of trees. polly quite agrees with me. she hates london; and says the happiest time in her life was when she was at dacrefield. my only comfort is to go to the old bookstalls and look for books about moths and butterflies. imagine! the other day when your aunt was out, i took polly with me. she said she would give anything on earth to go. so we went. we went into some awful streets, and had some oysters at a stall, and came back carrying no end of books; and just as we got in at the door there were your aunt and lady chelmsfield coming out. what a rage your aunt was in! i tried to take all the blame, but she shut polly up for a fortnight. it's a beastly shame, but polly says the expedition was worth it; her spirit is splendid. i never wrote such a long letter in my life before, but i am in the blues, and have no one to talk to. i wish my poor governor had lived. i wish i were in the country. i wish your aunt was a moth. wouldn't i pin her to a cork! mind you work[182] up old mother hubbard to a sumptuous provision of grub for next half, and don't forget the other grubs. would that i could dig with thee for them. vale!
"thine ever,
"lionel damer."
of course this ended in leo's being invited to dacrefield. he came, and, wonderful to relate, we got polly too. my father invited her and my aunt to visit us, and they came. as leo said, aunt maria "behaved better than we expected." indeed, leo had no reason to complain of her treatment of him as a rule, for he was constantly at the ascotts' house during his holidays.
and so we rambled and scrambled about together, leo, and polly, and i. and we added largely to our collections, and made a fernery (the rector helping us), and rode about the country, and were thoroughly happy. we generally went to the nursery for a short time before dressing for dinner, where we teased and coaxed mrs. bundle, and ate large slices of an excellent species of gingerbread called "parliament," which she kept in a tin case in the cupboard. in return for these we entertained her with marvellous "tales of school," rousing her indignation by terrible narratives of tyrannous and cruel fagging, and taking away her breath by tales of reckless daring, amusing impudence, or wanton destructiveness common to boys. some of these we afterwards confessed to be fables, told—as we politely put it—to "see how much she would swallow."
after dinner we were expected to sit with my father and aunt maria in the drawing-room. then, also, poor polly was expected to "give us a little music," and dutifully went through some[183] performances which were certainly a remarkable example of how much can be acquired in the way of mechanical musical skill where a real feeling for the art is absent. after politely offering to turn over the leaves of her music, which polly always declined (it was the key-note of her energetic character that she "liked to do everything herself"), my father generally fell asleep. i whiled away the time by playing with rubens under the table, aunt maria "superintended" the music in a way that must have made any less stolid performer nervous, and leo was apt to try and distract polly's attention by grimaces and pantomime of a far from respectful nature behind aunt maria's back.
sir lionel was not a favourite with nurse bundle. i was unfortunate enough to give her a prejudice against him, which nothing seemed to wear out. thinking his real, or affected mistake about her name a good joke, and having myself the strongest relish and admiration for his school-boy wit, i had told nurse bundle of his various versions of her name; and had tried to convey to her the comic nature of the scenes when my hat was pickled, and when leo condemned my home-made shirts.
but quite in vain. nurse bundle's sense of humour (if she had any) was not moved by the things that touched mine. she looked upon the destruction of the hat and the shirts as "a sinful waste," and as to leo's jokes—
"called me a baggage, did he?" said the indignant mrs. bundle. "i'll sir lionel him when i get the chance. at my time of life, too!"
and no explanation from me amended matters. by the time that leo did come, nurse bundle[184] had somewhat recovered from the insult, but he was never a favourite with her. he "chaffed" her freely, and mrs. bundle liked to be treated with respect. still there was a fascination about his beauty and his jokes against which even she was not always proof. i have seen her laugh and fetch out the parliament box when leo followed her about like a dog walking on its hind legs, wagging an old piece of rope at the end of his jacket for a tail, and singing—
"good mother hubbard,
pray what's in your cupboard?
could you give a poor dog a bone?"
and when he got the parliament he would "sit up" and balance a slice of the gingerbread on his nose, till polly and i cheered with delight, and rubens became frantic at the mockery of his own performances, and mrs. bundle complained that "sir lionel never knowed when to let nonsense be."
but i think she was something like the housemaid who "did the bedrooms," and who complained bitterly of the additional trouble given by leo and me when we were at dacrefield, and who was equally pathetic about the dulness of the hall when we returned to school. "the young gentlemen be a deal of trouble, but they do keep a bit of life in the place, sure enough."
