(a) Your Favourite Walk.
(b) Your Favourite Game.
(c) What shall I do next Half?
A nasty tag attached to m’ tutor’s order said “the letter must be of great length.” Little had they troubled about it till the end loomed, but then they rumbled wrathfully; well was it for their tutor he heard not what they said of him.
Tintinnabulum of course was merely lazy, or on principle resented writing anything for less than 3d. Grievous, however, was the burden on W. W., whose gifts lie not in a literary direction. He is always undone by his clear-headed way of putting everything he knows on any subject into the first sentence. He had a shot at (a), (b) and (c).
Attempt on (a). “My favourite walk is when I do not have far to go to it.” (Here he stuck.)
Attempt on (b). “The game of cricket is my favourite game, and it consists of six stumps, two bats and a ball.” After wandering round the table many times he added, “Nor must we forget the bails.” (Stuck again.)
Attempt on (c). “Next half is summer half, so early school will be half an hour earlier.” (Final stick.)
He then abandoned hope and would, I suppose, have had to run away to sea (if boys still do that) had not Help been nigh.
For a consideration (and you can now guess exactly how much it was) Tintinnabulum offered to write W. W.’s letter for him. I did not see it till later (as you shall learn), indeed the episode was purposely kept dark from me. The subject chosen was “My Favourite Walk,” because Tintinnabulum had a book entitled Walks and Talks with the Little Ones, which never before had he thought might come in handy. Of course such a performer by no means confined himself to purloining from this work, though he did have something to say about how W. W. wandered along his walk carrying a little book into which he put “interesting plants.” Anything less like W. W. thus engaged I cannot conceive, unless it be Tintinnabulum himself.