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MISS PRIMROSE.

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TAKE that there tin can,' said mother, sharp-like, and cut off and feed them two new lambs of the black ewe's. See that the bit of rag's round the spout too, or I'll show yer.'

I could see as mother were a bit roused by something, an' I shifted quick and laid hold of the can feyther had brought the sheep's milk in, and I went across to the shed to feed them lambs.

I seed Miss Primrose then, standin' in the middle of the yard, with her bicycle leanin' agin th' gate, and her eyes all blue and shining and dark like them periwinkles in the garden, and I stood staring at her all soft-like, and she went on smiling with her eyes, and her mouth was all solemn, and says she to me: Could you lend me a pump, and oh, are you going to feed the dear little lambs, and may I see?'

'Theer's t' pump,' I said, all dazed-like, pointing to it. Mother were swilling out milk-cans and pumping water like mad. An' then she laughed again, an' when I see her teeth-pearls they was, and no error, and I felt all soft agen when she said she meant a bicycle pump, and I said perhaps Higginses had one, up the lane, and I dropped the lambs' can, and run, and mother shouted after me an' I took no notice, and then Miss Primrose (mother told me at after), she picked up the can and said, What a funny long spout it had, and she was going to feed the lambs. while the dear little boy had gone to find the pump, and she made mother stop messin' with them cans and come and show her where the black ewe was, and she said the ewe's milk looked like honey, and she laughed when the lambs rushed at the can and hurt their silly selves agen it, and she said weren't they strong little creatures? and what fun it was, and she was so glad her tyre had gone down, and didn't mother just love taking care of all these darlings? And mother said that was all very well, but wait till you'd fifty of 'em under a fortnight old, and more coming every hour, and how would Miss Primrose like to get up in the middle of the night and tend the weakly ones, and for her part she thanked her Maker when the spring was well over, and all the creatures, calves and 43

VOL. XXV.-NO. 149, N.S.

chicks and ducklings and goslings and pigs, standing well on their own legs, and if you sent Peter off on an errand you could think yourself lucky if you saw him back in two hours. Just like mother. She's always sayin' things about me behind my back.

When I came back, Miss Primrose looked at me in the way that makes me all curl up inside, and send cold water down my back, and then showed me how to pump up her tyre and let me do it all by myself, and she told mother that I was very tall for eleven and that I had a Gainsbrer face. I did wish I knew what she meant by that, and when she'd gone I run in and looked at mysel' in the parlour mirrer to see if there was a smudge on my nose, and it wasn't no more dirty than usual, and mother said 'Come out of that parlour at once, with them boots,' and I went out the front way, not sayin' nothing to nobody, and forgetting what feyther had said about weedin' that there far bed in the garding, and making for the long pasture all in a daze like, with Miss Primrose's smile a-curling me up and upsetting me and making me feel that mother might sauce till she was blue in the face for all I cared. I wanted to run some more errands for 'er, and let her look at me like that agen. I wanted to see her all the time. I've never had nobody look at me like that afore-not as if they liked looking at me. Mother always looks at me as if I wanted my face washing, and feyther looks at me as if he was thinkin' which was the next best place to fetch me a clout on, an' our William looks at me as if I 'adn't ought to be let live at all.

I never went home to my dinner, but just stopped out in the pasture and ate some apples I'd happened to pick up in case I needed 'em, when mother sent me to the store room for onions before breakfast. When I went in they was all having their teas, and mother boxed me, and feyther fetched me a clout, and our William put out his foot and tripped me, and I never see such big boots as our William takes, an' mother said she'd saved me a bit of pie in the oven, and where in mercy's sake had I been off to with all the work and errands wanting doing, and William away fetching home the last lot of ewes and feyther seeing to the calves and all?

I seed by his face as feyther were thinking of fetching me another clout, so I told 'em I had a nedache and I'd bin asleep in the field, and mother said it was one of Peter's lies, but feyther mustn't hit me for fear I'd happened to tell the truth for once by accident. And William said, 'Not likely,' and then they all began talking about Miss Primrose from the Rectry, and how

pretty-faced and likely-looking she was, and how all the young fellers was courting her, and how she didn't seem to be in no hurry making up her mind, and that Mr. 'Ayes, so conceited like with 'is eyeglass, hadn't no chance at all. Feyther said, and mother said as how if she'd any sense she'd take Mr. Cartwright with all his father's money behind him. William said as how he wouldn't have minded having her himself if he'd been axed. And I tried to kick his shins under the table, but he never noticed, along of the size of his boots being so big.

'They're wanting a knife and boot boy at the Rectry,' mother said, putting the basket with the last chicks in the middle of the table alongside of the butter, and lettin' 'em jump in an' out amongst the tea-things. Asked me if I knew of a likely honest, trustworthy, indoostrious boy, she did. Lord, she's a deal to learn.'

Feyther had his mouth full, and he said he could a told 'er there was no such thing living.

'Not even in a mooseum,' said our William, laughing noisy like.

'Ay,' said mother, 'I told 'er as I'd never knowed a boy yet you could trust out of your sight. "They never strike stroke any of 'em when you aren't watchin' 'em," says I.'

'And not often then,' said our William, pouring his tea in his saucer. Low 'abits he has. I learned better nor that at the school treat.

'Lie?' said feyther. 'Ay, like a horse kicking. Ay, like a horse kicking. Prig!-Prig anything eatable as they can lay their 'ands on. Don't tell me.' No one was a-telling him. I go up when I'd done and give our William's elbow a shove an' made 'im slop his tea, and then I run out of the 'ouse, and I run down the lane, with my head all buzzing and singing, and I run all the way to the Rectry, and I seed Miss Primrose on the lawn in a blue dress, and no 'at on, and I run up to her quick and sez I to 'er :

'Please, do you want a boy?'

An' Miss Primrose turned to a tall gentleman with a neyeglass and sez, 'It's the Gainsbrer boy, Mr. Hayes. Look at his cherub cheeks and his angel eyes.' And the gentleman put his hand under my chin quite kind, and lifted my face up, and said I were a nice little chap. And another gentleman, a stoutish one, said Miss Primrose had a powerful 'magination.

I wanted to kick his shins same as I do our William's, but his

boots was thinner, and I daresent, and I said my name was Peter, and I was going in twelve, and I was in the fourth standard, but I'd had the 'oopin cough, and though the danger was over I was not going back to school till Whitweek, and could I come and clean their knives and boots for 'em till then?

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Eighteenpence a week,' said Miss Primrose.

the garden when you have time.'

'Yes, miss,' said I.

'And weed

'You're to be nice and obliging to mother and me, and try to save the cook's steps,' Miss Primrose went on,

I nodded. I was feeling terrible hot while they all looked at me so curious-like.

'All right,' said Miss Primrose. 'It's a bargain. Can you clean boots?'

I remembered the way our William hadn't never bin pleased with his Sunday boots when I'd done 'em.

'P'haps Cuke 'ull learn me,' I suggested timidly. An' that was the beginning of it. I was goin' to see Miss Primrose every day, and do things to make her look at me like as if she liked doin' it, and mother and feyther sauced a bit at first, but they gave in at last, and feyther said perhaps the rector would make me work, for it was more than he could do, and mother said I was to keep my fingers to myself and not go near the larder, and she hoped to goodness they kept things locked, and our William said to tell no more lies than I could help tellin'. When I'm grown up I shall give our William such a thundering good hiding as he's never had in his life.

I liked being at the Rectry very much at first. Miss Primrose used to come into the kitchen, and smile and push 'er 'air out of her eyes—it was all light and twiny, and say, 'Where's that Peter boy? I want him.' And I'd drop everything and run to 'er, and once when it was the knife powder the lid busted off, and it went all over Cuke's clean floor and she sauced something awful.

I could a' done with the work very well if it wasn't for Cuke. She'd got a nasty underhand way of standing over and watching till you'd done, and then making you do it all over again proper. I found a very good way with them knives. The board was on a big chest in the back kitchen, and whenever Cuke was stirring something with her back turned I used to drop a knife down behind the chest and go on rubbin' as if nothing had happened,

and then the next time there wasn't so many to do. I hid two big 'uns in an old roll of red carpet under the stairs, and I dropped two little 'uns down a grid.

After that, I got through the cleanin' very quick, and Miss Primrose praised me for it, and it wouldn't never have been found out if Jane hadn't run short when she was laying the dinner and began looking them up. She couldn't make 'em more than five large and seven small, she said, instead of twelve of each, and Cuke said, 'It's that dratted boy. Peter, where have you bin and put them knives?'

'I said I'd never seen no knives, and wherever could they have got to, Cuke ? and perhaps they might have fallen down behind the chest by accident.'

And then Cuke fetched me a clout and Jane boxed me, and they pulled the chest out and made me find the others too, and they was all red rust and it took me a whole day to get 'em right. All along of Cuke's nastiness too. I heard her say to Jane that there was something about them round red cheeks of Peter's as fairly asked for it. She's a deal too ready with 'er 'ands is Cuke, but I'd a stood more than that for Miss Primrose, and yet I couldn't do nothing really nice for 'er-not like all the young fellers did as wanted to please 'er. I couldn't go no rides with her, nor mend her bicycle. I did use to be let wash it for 'er, till she found me swishing buckets of water over it, and lettin' it dry by itself in the sun, and then she just looked solemn and said I was a lazy little boy, an' p'raps she'd better do it herself next time.

And then I were so sorry that I could have cried-sw'elp me. And I thought an' thought an'

Jane used always to try to get a nice quiet read when she was dusting the droring room, and I heard her tell Cuke it didn't do to let yerself get narrer, and I heard her telling Cuke all about a tale she'd been glancing at, where a butcher boy sent a bunch of white violets every morning to a beautiful lady; and I went cold all over, and thought of Percy Simms as went to school with me, an' his feyther's a butcher, and I was as good as him, and I'd given 'im a good hiding many a time, and he was only in the third standard, and what a chance to make Miss Primrose look at me again like as if she liked doing it.

'All by secret he sent 'em,' said Jane.

'Where was the sense of that?' said Cuke, short-like.

'More nobler and romantic,' said Jane.

And just the same

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