"Then, I suppose we must not use these wooden ones, my fanciful fairy?"
"Don't be so foolish, Lola!" snapped in Miss Prosody. "You'll spoil your frock; throw them away!"
"We can put them over the platters," said Cecil. "Hand out the edibles, Bluebell. What have you got?"
"Here's a pie, a cake, a tart, croquettes; no knives, about a pound of salt, and some butter in the last stage of dissolution."
"No knives!" cried Miss Prosody. "There must be!" plunging desperately into the basket.
"That is more untidy than a lily-leaf plate," remarked Lilla.
"No, positively not," said the governess. "How very remiss of Bowers, particularly as I observe he has provided forks!"
The children looked disappointed. They had been reckoning on the phenomenon of Miss Prosody, subjugated by hunger, eating pie with her fingers.
"Here be a knife!" said the boatman, wiping on his trousers the blade of his clasp-knife.
"Let as put a polish on," said Lilla, laughing at Cecil's face; and, jumping on to the bank, thrust it several times into the earth. The children, tired of their cramped position in the boat, wished to dine on shore; but it was thickly wooded, and there was no clear space; so Freddy was wedged into a fork of the tree, and Lola swung on another bough, where they chattered like two pies, handing down a basket on a string when they required fresh supplies.