One afternoon, towards the end of August, Cheriton went over to Elderthwaite. What with business at home, expeditions to Ashrigg, and a great many calls on his attention from more immediate neighbours, he had not seen very much of the parson, and as he neared the rectory he beheld an unwonted sight in the field adjoining, namely, some thirty or forty children drinking tea, under the superintendence of Virginia and one of the Miss Ellesmeres.
“Hallo, Cherry,” said the parson, advancing to meet him; “where have you been? Seems to me we must have a grand—what d’ye call it?—rural collation before we can get a sight of you.”
“As you never invited me to the rural collation, I was not aware of its existence,” said Cherry laughing, as Virginia approached him.
“Oh, Cherry, stay and start some games,” she said. “You know they are so ignorant, they never even saw a school-feast before.”
“Then, Virginia, I wonder at you for spoiling the last traces of such refreshing simplicity. Introducing juvenile dissipation! Well, it doesn’t seem as if the natural child wanted much training to appreciate plum-cake!”
“No; but if you could make the boys run for halfpence—”
“You think they won’t know a halfpenny when they see one.”
“Do have some tea!” said Lucy Ellesmere, running up to him. “Perhaps you are tired, and Virginia has given them beautiful tea, and really they’re very nice children, considering.”
So Cherry stayed, and advanced the education of the Elderthwaite youth by teaching them to bob for cherries, and other arts of polite society, ending by showing them how to give three cheers for the parson, and three times three for Miss Seyton; and while Virginia was dismissing her flock with final hunches of gingerbread, the parson called him into the house.
“Poor lassie!” he said; “she is fond of the children, and thinks a great deal of doing them good; but it’s little good she can do in the face of what’s coming.”