I find teaching infants needs much patience, but some days they are much brighter than others. They are getting on, and the four elder ones can read short words quite easily. They each have a book and read round in turn. The others, who know their alphabet, stand round, too, but of course take in but little. The four can actually add two to a number, and Arthur Repetto can even add four and five together. He puts his back into whatever he does. His mother is, I believe, rather stern with her children; and some think they are whipped too much. However this may be, they seem to be turning out well. Certainly all the mothers seem to teach their children good manners; for example, if our boy William sees me standing in school, he will get up and offer me a seat. He is very thoughtful, and if we express a wish about anything, it is sure to be done. His duties are to chop wood, to go to the spring for the drinking water, and to fill the pails twice a day. If he happens not to be at home he always sees that some one else does his work.
Thursday, August 2.—This afternoon after choir practice Ellen and I went down to the rocks, although it was very cold, to try to catch craw-fish. We had not started fishing when we saw William running towards us. He came to say a ship was in view to the west and that the men were going off. So of course we hurried up again to get our letters ready. The boats put off about five o'clock and probably will not be back before daylight.
Friday, August 3.—The men returned late last evening after a fruitless journey. Although it was a moonlight night they failed to sight the ship. They were very wet.
Graham is digging the lower part of the garden. It is covered with turf which, as he removes, he banks up to form a little shelter from the wind for the vegetables, if ever there are any. Flax shelters the bed on the other side. The digging is rather laborious, as there are large stones which have to be extracted with a crowbar. The soil is first-rate, and so far no mildew has been met with. One of the greatest enemies to the seeds will be the fowls, and because of them probably we shall have to sow first in boxes. Graham has made a needle and mesh so that we can make nets. Repetto has shown us how to start netting. It is not known who brought flax to the isle, but Betty says her father and his contemporaries brought it to the settlement from Sandy Point.
CHAPTER XII
Friday, August 10.—We had a gale last Wednesday. It was with some difficulty we got to the women's meeting which had been postponed the day before on account of the weather; we had to go by a circuitous route. Only three women came, and I was debating whether to have the meeting when I missed my spectacles. I felt sure they had been blown off by the wind. Mrs. Repetto and Mrs. Hagan went off to search for them, and Ellen and I soon followed. It seemed rather a hopeless task as we had come by such a round-about way. I went home to see if I could possibly have left them behind; but no, they were not there. The loss of them was rather serious, as I had broken my pince-nez the day after landing. I felt sure they would be found if only we searched long enough, and presently I came across one half of them. By this time about fourteen people, men as well as women, were looking for them. The gale was terrific, and when the gusts came the only thing to do was to crouch down. It was a comical sight, and I wish I could have photographed it. I was caught hold of several times by one of the elder girls and held when the gusts came. I promised a pot of jam to the one who should find the other half of the spectacles. We had been out over an hour and were beginning to think we must leave further search till the morning when John Glass found it. It had been blown some distance from the spot where I had found the first half. Glass was going to take them home to try to mend them when he was called off to a poor cow that had fallen down. At his suggestion Graham took them to Repetto, who brought them down in the evening. He is going to mend my pince-nez with a watch spring. From what he told us I fear the loss of cattle must be close upon a hundred.
Monday, August 13.—We have been building a most delightful castle in the air to-day. If a man-of-war comes we might go back in it to Cape Town and try to arrange with some enterprising person to come in a schooner and buy up the cattle here at a low price. What commissions we should have to execute for the people!
This has been a full day from morning till evening. I began laundry work at 7.30, made a yeast, then potato-cakes, superintended the planting of peach-slips against the house, paid a visit to Mrs. Henry Green, and entertained about seven visitors—several with requests to be attended to. Graham was digging all the afternoon.
Tuesday, August 14.—Little Edith Swain, one of the infants, has had a cough, and as her mother said she thought she had not warm enough clothing, I set to and knitted her a vest in two days. This morning Edith appeared alone, and pushing past Ellen, who opened the door, came and put into my hand something tied up in a pocket-handkerchief, which something proved to be a pair of stockings. Her mother, who came in later, told me that Edith asked if she could not give Mrs. Barrow a present, so she gave her the pair of stockings to bring. She said to her mother, "Did you offer Mrs. Barrow a cup of tea when she came?" She is not a very bright child and cannot learn her ABC, though she learns by heart very nicely.
The Repetto's youngest child, Joe, who is not yet two, asked his father for a book the other day and marched off to school with it. He got across the brook without getting wet, and as he neared the school door was heard singing, "Onward, Christian Soldiers." His sister Martha soon dispatched him home, poor little fellow. Repetto came this afternoon with the pince-nez which he had mended. He stayed supper and gave us further instruction in netting.