XVIII.
The essay I set to-day was this:—"Imagine that you are an old lady who ordered a duck from Gamage's, and imagine that they sent you an aeroplane in a crate by mistake. Then describe in the first person the feelings of the aviator who found the duck awaiting him at breakfast time."
One girl wrote:—"Dear Mr. Gamage, I have not opened the basket, but it seems to be an ostrich that you have sent. What will I feed it on?"
A boy, as the aviator, wrote: "If you think I am going to risk my life on the machine you sent you are wrong. It hasn't got a petrol tank."
The theme was too difficult for the bairns; they could not see the ludicrous side. I don't think one of them visualised the poor old woman gazing in dismay on the workmen unloading the crate. H. M. Bateman would have made an excellent drawing of the incident.
I tried another theme.
"A few days ago I gave you a ha'penny each," I said. "Write a description of how you spent it, and I'll give sixpence to the one who tells the biggest lie."
I got some tall yarns. One chap bought an aeroplane and torpedoed a Zeppelin with it; one girl bought a thousand motor-cars. But Jack Hood, the dunce of the class, wrote these words: "I took it to the church on Sunday and put it in the clecshun bag."
I gave him the tanner, although I knew that he had won it by accident. I don't think that Jack will ever get so great a surprise again in this life.