PART III

CHAPTER XVI

THE POETRY OF LEARNING

To forget the pa.s.sage of time you must live in the open air, in a warm climate, with as few clothes as possible upon you. You must collect and cook your own food. Then, after a while, if you have no special ties to bind you to civilisation, Nature will begin to do for you what she does for the savage. You will recognise that it is possible to be happy without books or newspapers, letters or bills. You will recognise the part sleep plays in Nature.

After a month on the island you might have seen d.i.c.k at one moment full of life and activity, helping Mr b.u.t.ton to dig up a taro root or what-not, the next curled up to sleep like a dog. Emmeline the same.

Profound and prolonged lapses into sleep; sudden awakenings into a world of pure air and dazzling light, the gaiety of colour all round.

Nature had indeed opened her doors to these children.

One might have fancied her in an experimental mood, saying: "Let me put these buds of civilisation back into my nursery and see what they will become--how they will blossom, and what will be the end of it all."

Just as Emmeline had brought away her treasured box from the Northumberland, d.i.c.k had conveyed with him a small linen bag that c.h.i.n.ked when shaken. It contained marbles. Small olive-green marbles and middle-sized ones of various colours; gla.s.s marbles with splendid coloured cores; and one large old grandfather marble too big to be played with, but none the less to be worshipped--a G.o.d marble.

Of course one cannot play at marbles on board ship, but one can play WITH them. They had been a great comfort to d.i.c.k on the voyage. He knew them each personally, and he would roll them out on the mattress of his bunk and review them nearly every day, whilst Emmeline looked on.

One day Mr b.u.t.ton, noticing d.i.c.k and the girl kneeling opposite each other on a flat, hard piece of sand near the water's edge, strolled up to see what they were doing. They were playing marbles. He stood with his hands in his pockets and his pipe in his mouth watching and criticising the game, pleased that the "childer" were amused. Then he began to be amused himself, and in a few minutes more he was down on his knees taking a hand; Emmeline, a poor player and an unenthusiastic one, withdrawing in his favour.

After that it was a common thing to see them playing together, the old sailor on his knees, one eye shut, and a marble against the nail of his h.o.r.n.y thumb taking aim; d.i.c.k and Emmeline on the watch to make sure he was playing fair, their shrill voices echoing amidst the cocoa-nut trees with cries of "Knuckle down, Paddy, knuckle down!" He entered into all their amus.e.m.e.nts just as one of themselves. On high and rare occasions Emmeline would open her precious box, spread its contents and give a tea-party, Mr b.u.t.ton acting as guest or president as the case might be.

"Is your tay to your likin', ma'am?" he would enquire; and Emmeline, sipping at her tiny cup, would invariably make answer: "Another lump of sugar, if you please, Mr b.u.t.ton"; to which would come the stereotyped reply: "Take a dozen, and welcome; and another cup for the good of your make."

Then Emmeline would wash the things in imaginary water, replace them in the box, and every one would lose their company manners and become quite natural again.

"Have you ever seen your name, Paddy?" asked d.i.c.k one morning.

"Seen me which?"

"Your name?"

"Arrah, don't be axin' me questions," replied the other. "How the divil could I see me name?"

"Wait and I'll show you," replied d.i.c.k.

He ran and fetched a piece of cane, and a minute later on the salt-white sand in face of orthography and the sun appeared these portentous letters:

B U T T E N

"Faith, an' it's a cliver boy y'are," said Mr b.u.t.ton admiringly, as he leaned luxuriously against a cocoa-nut tree, and contemplated d.i.c.k's handiwork. "And that's me name, is it? What's the letters in it?"

d.i.c.k enumerated them.

"I'll teach you to do it, too," he said. "I'll teach you to write your name, Paddy--would you like to write your name, Paddy?"

"No," replied the other, who only wanted to be let smoke his pipe in peace; "me name's no use to me."

But d.i.c.k, with the terrible gadfly tirelessness of childhood, was not to be put off, and the unfortunate Mr b.u.t.ton had to go to school despite himself. In a few days he could achieve the act of drawing upon the sand characters somewhat like the above, but not without prompting, d.i.c.k and Emmeline on each side of him, breathless for fear of a mistake.

"Which next?" would ask the sweating scribe, the perspiration pouring from his forehead--"which next? An' be quick, for it's moithered I am."

"N. N--that's right. Ow, you're making it crooked!--THAT'S right--there! it's all there now--Hurroo!"

"Hurroo!" would answer the scholar, waving his old hat over his own name, and "Hurroo!" would answer the cocoa-nut grove echoes; whilst the far, faint "Hi, hi!" of the wheeling gulls on the reef would come over the blue lagoon as if in acknowledgment of the deed, and encouragement.

The appet.i.te comes with teaching. The pleasantest mental exercise of childhood is the instruction of one's elders. Even Emmeline felt this.

She took the geography cla.s.s one day in a timid manner, putting her little hand first in the great h.o.r.n.y fist of her friend.

"Mr b.u.t.ton!"

"Well, honey?"

"I know g'ography."

"And what's that?" asked Mr b.u.t.ton.

This stumped Emmeline for a moment.

"It's where places are," she said at last.

"Which places?" enquired he.

"All sorts of places," replied Emmeline. "Mr b.u.t.ton!"

"What is it, darlin'?"

"Would you like to learn g'ography?"

"I'm not wishful for larnin'," said the other hurriedly. "It makes me head buzz to hear them things they rade out of books."

"Paddy," said d.i.c.k, who was strong on drawing that afternoon, "look here." He drew the following on the sand:

[Ill.u.s.tration: A bad drawing of an elephant]

"That's an elephant," he said in a dubious voice.

Mr b.u.t.ton grunted, and the sound was by no means filled with enthusiastic a.s.sent. A chill fell on the proceedings.

d.i.c.k wiped the elephant slowly and regretfully out, whilst Emmeline felt disheartened. Then her face suddenly cleared; the seraphic smile came into it for a moment--a bright idea had struck her.

"d.i.c.ky," she said, "draw Henry the Eight."

d.i.c.k's face brightened. He cleared the sand and drew the following figure:

l l /

"THAT'S not Henry the Eight," he explained, "but he will be in a minute. Daddy showed me how to draw him; he's nothing till he gets his hat on."