When the Head came back we were all sent for after tea and there was a pi-jaw. Wilson had his First Div. privileges taken away for the rest of the term, and the Holiday was stopped.
The other day Mason missed three Guatemalar green parrots from his stamp collexion which he had swoped with Jackson for a toad. It was a beastly swindel because the toad was blind. Jackson who is always sucking up to Colly sneeked about the stamps and Mac said he knew it was someone in his Div. who had bagged the stamps and if the chap didn’t own up he’d give the whole Div. an electric shock with his beastly battery.
Nobody owned up and the whole Second Div. had to join hands and they said Mac gave them the biggest shock theyd ever had. They didnt care but when it was over Middleton took the battery and threw it at Mac’s head. We all thought hed be expelled but Mac didn’t even sneek to the Head which was jolly decent of him. Mac can be awfully decent sometimes. After this Butler began to blub and then he said he had bagged the stamps but he meant to give them back. Mac told Butler he would find himself in Queer Street. We all knew what that meant and didnt we just tell him! Nothing happened till Monday morning—then at reeding over the Head gave the Second Div. a jaw. He said they were mutinus and as bad as feenians—a feenian is a man who eats mustard with mutton—and that Butler was a thief and a traitor worse than Gladstone. Butler’s pater is a liberal and some of the chaps say he’s a pal of Gladstone’s and you can just think how the Head gave it him. Butler was swished. Simpson ma. and Pearse held him down and he squeeled like anything. The Head gave him fifteen from the shoulder which Gordon says is against the law. The Head had a glass of shery before the swishing.
Last week there was elexions going on. The Head got a notice from the Reding Club asking him to vote for the Lib. Wasnt he waxy! He read us out the letter at tea and jawed about the Church and State and said he would send back the letter with some coppers in it so that they would have to pay 8d. He said a radical was worse than a feenian. We were taken to the elexion and we all wore blue ribbons in our buttonholes. The Libs werent allowed to go. There are only seven but I believe Rowley’s pater is a lib. although he swears he isnt.
Next week we are going to have athletic sports. I think I shall win the hurdel race and the high. Campbell’s sister’s name is Ann. Mason saw it at the end of a letter. Now we all call him Mary Ann. He’s awfully sick about it.
There’s a new chap called Gunter—a little beast. He’s the cheekiest squit I’ve ever seen. Colly reported him for stealing sugar from the pantry and he was warned that if he did anything again he would be turned out of the choir and swiped although it was his first term. He has got cheek! He called Alston who is now top of the First Div. and captain of the Eleven, Piggy. Alston smacked his head. Fancy a Fourth Div. squit calling Alston piggy! Only the Head dares do that. He’s awfully dirty too and never washes. Colly nabbed him smacking Melton mi. with a slipper and he was reported again so he was swished. The Head said it was the first time a new chap had ever been swished and afterwards he kicked the Head’s straw hat through the Hall. We don’t know yet what will happen but we think he’ll be expeled.
I got into a row with Mac last week. While we were having tea he passed up that Bell and me were to stop talking. It never got to us and Mac sent for me afterwards and said he knew what I was up to and I’d better look out or I’d find myself in Queer Street and he stopped me talking for a week.
The Head’s reading us out an awfully good Book called “Tresure Island” and he’s just finished a better one called “The Last Abot of Glasconbury.” In the First Div. we do have to swot but in the First Set with Colly for maths and French we don’t do a stroke of work. You should hear Lambert the frenchy cheek him. He goes up to him and asks him whether one ought to pronounce yeux youks or yeks and Colly doesn’t dare pronounce it and says he ought to know. Then Lambert says “I’ve forgotten Sir I really don’t know how to.”
Yesterday in school we lit some patent pills which you burn and a snake comes out. Colly who is awfully blind asked what I was doing. I just had time to put it in my desk and said I had dropped my pen. Only one bung and he believed it! On Valentine’s Day we sent Colly some sweets with biter alows inside them the stuff Mac puts on Watson’s fingers when he bites his nails and he eat them.
Last week the Choir expedition came off. They went to Reding to see the biskits made and then to Bath. If I was staying on next term I should be in the Eleven and get my flanels.