This was good, and Toady Lion was duly grateful; but he wished his good fortune put into a more concrete form.
"Can I have the biggest and nicerest saucer of the scrapings of the preserving-pan to-night?"
Hugh John considered a moment. An impulse of generosity swept over him.
"Yes, you can," he said nobly. Then a cross wave of caution caused him to add—"that is, if it isn't rasps!"
Now the children of the house of Windy Standard were permitted to clean out the boiling-pan in the fruit-preserving season with worn horn spoons, in order not to scratch the copper or crack the enamel. And rasp was Hugh John's favourite.
"Huh," said Toady Lion, turning up a contemptuous nose. "Thank 'oo for nuffin! I like wasps just as much as 'oo, Hugh John Picton Smiff!"
"Don't answer me back, sir!"—Hugh John was using his father's words and manner.
"Sall if I like," said Toady Lion, beginning to whimper. "Sall go and tell Janet Sheepshanks, and she'll give me yots of wasps! Not scrapin's neither, but weal-weal wasps—so there!"
"Toady Lion, I shall degrade you to the ranks. You are a little pig and a disgrace to the army."
"Don't care, I wants wasps—and I d'livered Donald," reiterated the Disgrace of the Army.