ALARUMS AND EXCURSIONS
'LET'S pretend,' suggested Harold, 'that we're Cavaliers and Roundheads; and you be a Roundhead!'
'O bother,' I replied drowsily, 'we pretended that yesterday; and it's not my turn to be a Roundhead, anyhow.' The fact is, I was lazy, and the call to arms fell on indifferent ears. We three younger ones were stretched at length in the orchard. The sun was hot, the season merry June, and never (I thought) had there been such wealth and riot of buttercups throughout the lush grass. Green-and-gold was the dominant key that day. Instead of active 'pretence' with its shouts and its perspiration, how much better—I held—to lie at ease and pretend to one's self, in green and golden fancies, slipping the husk and passing, a careless lounger, through a sleepy imaginary world all
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