The Right Stuff: Some Episodes in the Career of a North Briton

inctiveness about Sunday morning which is

to-day,-this is probably due to the fact that we used to have a half-holiday on Wednesdays at school; and when I got into Parliament I found that the same rule held there; Thursday I regard as one who ploughs steadily on his way, lacking

y of the morning; and at Oxford, I remember, I found it necessary to instruct my scout to rouse me from slumber in some such fashion as thi

wn, where the silence of the streets and the sound of bells proclaim the day; but why the same phenomenon should

ncle, Sir John Rubislaw, a retired Admiral of the Fleet, whose forty years' official connection with Britannia's realm betrayed itself in a nautical roll, syncopated by gout, and what

g qualities delicate fancy was not included, put it down to the smell of some special dish indigenous to Sunday breakfast. My brother-

red Dolly

American young lady's army of worshippers. The rest of us had stayed at home-the Admiral because he not infrequently did so; I because I was expecting Robin back by the "machine" (which was to pick him up at a wayside station, where he had been sitting on his portmanteau ever since six o'clock that morning, h

nding (and obtaining) various special privileges of an unofficial character this hot Sunday morning. Consequently a spiritually willing but carnally incompetent band, consisting of one jovial but arthritic baronet, one docile but sel

olemnly chanting a ditty of the "I-saw-a-ship-a-sail

es round went t

times rou

s round went th

of the revels, in a hoarse and hurried

the bottom-

l down!" scr

miral made when my left elbow descended upon his goutiest foot was fortun

and I for Baby Bear. The Admiral, at his own urgent request, was allotted the comparatively unimportant part of Baby Bear's bed, and sat nursing his foot and observing with keen relish the preparations of the Bear family for their

round bushes, entered and advanced to the rustic table, where she proceeded to test the contents

id, after samplin

e continued, t

and swallowed its contents (some heather

sofa-cushions and the Admiral), and finally Curl

porridge-bowl was so realistic that the Stage Manager sat up in bed and commended me for it. Finally we went the round of the furniture; Curly Locks was duly discovered; and

embrace from Phillis to be introduced to those whom he did not, I took him off indoors for a meal, throug

r for Dermott," I said.

the letter to Dermott, who was falling

ibly official," said Doll

lunch-time." And he stuffed the offending epistle into his pocket, and returned to t

nt explanations of his own presence. The experts at countless tea-tables and shooting-lunches were practically unanimous in the opinion that Dolly could land her fish when she chose now; and as the fish was a good fellow, and c

ood deal to sign and a good deal to digest, and a good deal that was of no importance whatsoeve

id. "There's to be a D

answer, and

" stood patiently in a row, until "It," after mature consideration, beckoned invitingly to one of them to approach. This invitation might or might not be a genuine one, for sometimes the player on responding was received by the beckoner with hi

, Dermott, and the Admiral stood meekly in line awaiting selection. Dolly and the Admiral were each called without being chosen, and Phillis's final selection prov

that gentleman's apprehensions by sibilant noises, waggl

u like," said Phil

t he made no sign, and the game f

he prompter, "'I choo

rt, relegated the greatly relieved Dolly to the ranks, and smoothed over the situ

lution to him twice before he grasped its full significance. Even then he displayed about one-tenth of the excitement I should have expected of him; and fin

Robin appeared-not for the first time, evidently-as a boy called Henry, and Phillis doubled the parts of Henry's mother and a fairy. These two r?les absorbed practically the whole

The next scene revealed him in class, where the schoolmaster (Dolly, assiduously prompted by Phillis) asked him a series of questions, which he answered so incorrectly as to incur the extreme penalty of "the muckle tawse." (Here what textual critics term "internal evidence of a l

or presently he was cut short by a s

fairy," said H

last, pirouetted before hi

"Say, 'I wish that all Pain was

I wish that all Pain was P

nnounced the fairy sole

e during which he was enduring the tawse, getting out of bed on a cold morning, or doing something equally unpleasant. On the other hand, his comfortable bed had be

n-top. The indulgent fairy kindly agreed to put things right, but only under penalty of an improving homily on contentment with one's lot and the fatuity of asking for what you do not really want. This was only half finished when the party re