Or he would quiz me, and say, “Are you Jack, or are you Jill?”
It will be observed that father had taken to call us Jack and Jill, though auntie rather objected.
But hardly any one else knew us apart even on week-days; even Sally was puzzled, and Robert never made any attempt at nomenclature.
In fact we were a kind of Corsican brothers in similitude, for, if I remember rightly, they were twins like Jill and me.
On the Sunday afternoons my brother and I were sent, if the weather was fine, to take a stroll along by the windings and bendings of the beach, between the green rising hills and banks and the sea. We went all alone, and were recommended by auntie to think about all good things as we walked, to study the strange objects strewn on the sand or left by the receding waves, to gaze upon the sea, the sky, the rocks, and the beautiful birds, and to remember our Father in heaven made them all. We were not to think our week-day thoughts, but rigidly to banish and exclude therefrom, tops, whips, balls, and boats; we were not to fling pebbles, nor jump on seaweed; we must walk erect not too close to the water, for fear of our boots, and if a shower came on we were to wrap our pocket-handkerchiefs round our hats and make straight for home.
All these injunctions we did our best to obey, except one which I have forgotten to name: we were not to laugh. Now we would have obeyed auntie even in this, but sometimes we were carried away by curious things occurring. Anyhow, it did not take much to make us laugh, I fear, even on Sunday. Take one walk as an example.
It was a lovely summer’s afternoon, hardly any wind, the sea almost glassy or glossy—use which word you please; far out were vessels with all kinds of queer rigs half-becalmed, and close in the foreground the breakers rolling in so lazily that it seemed a stress for them to break at all. There was a dreamy stillness in the air, and even the sea-birds seemed to feel its influence, and floated half asleep on the sleeping billows.
Jill and I were walking a little apart when we met a big red dog. He half started when he saw the pair of us, glanced quickly from one to the other, gave a short bark which appeared forced out of him, and trotted off with his tail between his hocks. He must have seen, or thought he saw, something odd about us.
We laughed, but thought of auntie.