THE WOULDBEGOODS
the struggle with Dicky, Oswald heard the voice of Denny murmuring one of his everlasting quotations:
"'Come back, come back!' he cried in Greek,
'Across the stormy water,
And I'll forgive your Highland cheek,
My daughter, O my daughter!'"
When quiet was restored and Dicky had agreed to go through with the Council, Denny said:
"The Daisy Chain is not a bit like that really. It's a ripping book. One of the boys dresses up like a lady and comes to call, and another tries to hit his little sister with a hoe. It's jolly fine, I tell you."
Denny is learning to say what he thinks, just like other boys. He would never have learned such words as "ripping" and "jolly fine" while under the auntal tyranny.
Since then I have read The Daisy Chain. It is a first-rate book for girls and little boys.
But we did not want to talk about The Daisy Chain just then, so Oswald said:
"But what's your lark?"
Denny got pale pink and said:
"Don't hurry me. I'll tell you directly. Let me think a minute."
Then he shut his pale pink eyelids a moment in thought, and then opened them and stood up on the straw and said very fast:
"Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears, or if not ears, pots. You know we've been told that they are going to open the barrow,
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