“Good idea! Why not, indeed?”
And before any one knew how or where it was done it had been definitely decided that we should have a Christmas picnic in a lovely spot called Green Streams ten miles away.
Personally I was not very keen on this plan, and I knew that a great many others felt the same way about it. There seemed to be a certain heartlessness in celebrating Christmas so pleasantly while our men were still away at the front, even though we were assured that all was well with them—that they were not fighting, but merely making a triumphal march on the retreating enemy, in order to bring back the legal trophies of war. However, so many people seemed eager for the picnic, and really physically to need a change of air and scene from Fort George, and the children were so wistful about it, that it seemed selfish to protest against the plan. And I am sure that it was mainly for the children’s sake that many of us resisted the desire to remain at home, instead of picnicking on the veldt.
Once the thing was settled, though, every one threw themselves with a zest into preparations. Cooking went on at a great rate, and the whole town smelt of belated plum-puddings, and hams bubbling in three-legged pots. And outside every house were to be seen half-a-dozen Mashona hens with their necks wrung. I may mention that there is about three mouthfuls of flesh on each of these birds.
Every one was frightfully busy filling empty packing-cases with crockery and pots and pans, and late into the night people were still carrying things to be piled into the waggon. It was like the preparations of the Israelites for their departure to the promised land.
The next day, at six o’clock of a blue-and-gold morning, we set out. Some of the women-folk, and the smaller children, rode in the waggon, but most of us cheerfully padded the hoof, glad of the opportunity to stretch our limbs over the short, burnt grass, regardless of such trifles as stick-grass and ticks.
The children begged to wear their scarlet uniforms, and they danced along yelling and prancing, like a band of red Indians let loose.
We reached Green Streams at about nine o’clock and found it a lovely open glade with clumps of trees scattered everywhere, and huge cliffy rocks standing alone, and a slender little fringed river curling like a silver caterpillar through the middle of the scene. Soon the lovely smell of wood fires was on the air, and every climbable rock had a scarlet spot decorating its summit.
“I think it was an excellent idea of yours, Miss Saurin, to let the children wear their uniforms,” said Mrs Burney. “We can’t possibly lose sight of them now, can we?”
“It was their own idea,” I said. “They adore that get-up of theirs.”