“No, I don’t think so.”
“Then you haven’t. You’ll hear them to-night, if it’s fine, singing away in the copses, and answering one another for miles round.”
“Why, this must be a beautiful place, then?”
“I should think it is—it’s lovely. I don’t mean the school; I hate that, and the way they bore you over the lessons, and the more stupid you are, the harder they are upon you. I’m always catching it. ’Tain’t my fault I’m so stupid.”
I looked at him sharply, for he seemed to me to be crammed full of knowledge.
“The Doctor told me one day I was a miserable young idiot, and that I thought about nothing but birds and butterflies. Can’t help it. I like to. I say, we’ll go egging as soon as we’ve seen the owls. Wonder whether I can get an owl’s egg for my collection. I’ve got two night-jars’.”
“Out of the nest?”
“They don’t make any nest; I found them just as they were laid on some chips, where they were cutting down and trimming young trees for hop-poles. Such beauties! But come along. Yes, he said I was a young idiot, but father don’t mind my wanting to collect things. He likes natural history, and mamma collects plants, and names them. She can tell you the names of all the flowers you pass by, and—whisht—snake!”
“Where? Where?”
“Only gone across here,” said my companion, pointing to a winding track in the dusty road, showing where the reptile must have crossed from one side to the other.