United States or Guyana ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Just then, father comes up and says, "Count them punnits, Dick! there ought to be forty on 'em. Twenty picked large for Mr. Moses, and twenty usuals for Marts! two of our best customers they was. Well, Dick, he counts 'em, and soon misses one. 'Thirty-eight, thirty-nine, he sez, and no more; 'but 'ere's a empty punnit, he sez.
I was standing near, feelin' awful, and wished I'd said I'd eat the plums afore Dick begun to count 'em, but I didn't, and after that I couldn't. 'Joe! sez Dick, 'I wants yer! 'Ow come this empty punnit 'ere, along of the others? there's plums bin in it, I can see, 'cos it's not new. Speak up, youngster! I looked at Dick's face, Mrs.
"A matter of principle with you, was it, Mr. Beaumaroy?" "No instinct, I think. It's my instinct to be against the proper thing, the regular thing, the thing that deals hardly with an individual in the name of some highly nebulous general principle." "Like discipline?" she put in, with a reminiscence of Major-General Punnit. He nodded. "Yes, that's one case of it.
The envious years had refused to Major-General Punnit, C.B. he was a distant cousin of Mrs. Naylor's the privilege of serving his country in the Great War. His career had lain mainly in India and was mostly behind him even at the date of the South African War, in which, however, he had done valuable work in one of the supply services.
Naylor apologized. "I've a desperate instinct to fit all these young fellows up with mates as soon as possible. Isn't it only fair?" "And also extremely expedient. But it's the sort of thing you can leave to them, can't you?" "As to Beaumaroy I suppose you meant him, not Alec I think you must have been talking to old Tom Punnit or, rather, hearing him talk."
It was a broilin' 'ot day, and I was tired, 'avin' been stoopin' over the baskits since four in the morning, and as I put the leaves over the plums I touched 'em; they felt so lovely and cool, and looked so juicy-like, I felt I must eat one, and I did; there was just six on 'em, and when I'd bin and eat one, there seemed such a empty place left in the punnit, that I knew father'd be sure to see it, so I eat 'em all, and then threw the punnit to one side.
At the tea table they found General Punnit discoursing on war, and giving "idealists" what idealists usually get. The General believed in war; he pressed the biological argument, did not flinch when Mr. War tested, proved, braced, hardened; it was nature's crucible; it was the antidote to softness and sentimentality; it was the vindication of the strong, the elimination of the weak.
It appealed to some of those tendencies and impulses of his character which had earned such heavy censure from Major-General Punnit and had produced so grave an expression on Captain Alec's handsome face without, however, being, even in that officer's exacting judgment, disgraceful.
Besides, I've a penchant for failures." That was what General Punnit had said! Alec Naylor grew impatient. "That's the very spirit we have to fight against!" he exclaimed, rather hotly. "Forgive me, but, please, don't raise your voice." Alec lowered his voice, for a moment anyhow, but the central article of his creed was assailed, and he grew vehement.
"What say you, Tom Punnit?" "It never occurred to me to put the question," the General answered brusquely. "May I ask why not, sir?" said Beaumaroy respectfully. "Because I believed in God. I knew that we were right, and I knew that we should win." "Are we in theology now, or still in biology?" asked Irechester, rather acidly. "You're getting out of my 'depth anyhow," smiled Mrs. Naylor.
Word Of The Day