“Oh!” burst from Phoena, her face all aglow, but Andrew cut her short.
“What do you know about glow-worms?” he asked, in a tone of unmitigated contempt, “what’s the Latin name for them?”
“She doesn’t know, and she doesn’t want to know,” cried Jack, “so you can keep your mouldy old Latin for yourself.”
“Or talk it to Dragon,” put in Di, whose tongue had unfortunately a rather sharp point, “for it’s only dog-latin, so Phil says.”
Without condescending to note this last insult, Andrew resumed his attack on Phoena.
“You had better leave glow-worms—in fact, all insects—alone,” he remarked, “until you’ve learnt something about them. When I’ve time, I can teach you a lot about them; in the meanwhile, you may carry my insect boxes for me when I go on my entomological expeditions.”
“There, if you young gentlemen want to hunt insecks,” broke in Mrs. Busson, who felt that the atmosphere was becoming rather storm-laden, “I do wish you’d hunt the garden slugs, they’re just ruinating all our green-stuff.”
“Oh! we’ll ruinate them,” cried the schoolboys, but Andrew added, “They are, of course, most destructive garden pests. Now I wonder if any of you know how many teeth a garden slug has.”
“Never had the pleasure of accompanying one to a dentist’s,” said Di. Whereupon there was a general laugh.
“There’s nothing to laugh at in your ignorance,” cried Andrew, “a garden slug—”