Chapter 17. High Flying

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_ CHAPTER SEVENTEEN. HIGH FLYING

The next morning the boys had their regular run in the garden before breakfast, and then Harry divulged the plan of their morning's amusement--for the next day was to be devoted to fishing at Lord Copsedale's lake, when they hoped to persuade Mr Inglis to accompany them; the present day, which was first chosen, not being considered suitable, as Mr Inglis was going from home. Directly after breakfast, they set about the first part of Harry's plan, which was to get all the baits and tackle ready for the next day--a most business-like proceeding, but quite in opposition to Harry and Philip's general habit, for they in most cases left their preparations to the last moment. But not so now, for, as I said before, they wanted Papa to accompany them, and they well knew that he would not go unless there were plenty of good baits, and the tackle all in order. The first thing to be done seemed to be to get some good worms from down by the cucumber-frames, and then put them in some cool damp moss; but Philip opposed this, and showed some little degree of foresight, for, said he--

"We have never had the wasps' nest out of the tree yet; and we shall want the grubs, for Papa likes them for the trout and chub, and we shall want old Sam to split the tree up with his big wedges; while, if we go poking about round the cucumber-frames first, he'll turn grumpy, and won't split the old willow-tree for us."

"That's right, Phil, so let's go and get the tree split first; and then we'll turn up the old cucumber bed in fine style," said Harry.

Sam was soon found, but Sam was busy. Sam was weeding the "inguns," and "inguns was more consekens than the nasty wopses." So Sam had to be coaxed and cajoled; but Sam would not be either coaxed or cajoled, for he was very grumpy indeed; and the reason was, that he had had the lawn to mow that morning, and there had been no dew, and the consequence was, the grass, instead of being easy to cut from its crispness and dampness, was very limp and wiry, so that poor Sam had a very hard and unsatisfactory job, and the effect of it all was that he was as limp and wiry as the grass had been. It was of no use to say, "Do, Sam," or "Do, please, Sam," or "That's a good old chap, now," or anything of that kind; for Sam weeded away viciously amongst the onions, and turned a deaf ear to everything; so Harry, the impetuous, was beginning to grow cross too, and to repent that they had not obtained the worms at first, when Sam showed the weak side of his nature, and from that moment he was a conquered man.

"Ugh!" said Sam, straightening himself with a groan, and rubbing his back where it ached, "Ugh! how blazing hot the sun is--always does shine like that when I be weeding. Oh, my back! Oh, dear!" And then Sam groaned, and stooped to his work again, saying, "And nobody never asks nobody to have so much as a drop o' beer."

"I'll fetch you some beer, Sam, if you'll go with us," said Harry.

But Sam didn't want any beer. Oh, no! He could do his work without beer. He never did do more than wet his lips; and so on. But Sam had given up the key of his fortress, and very soon Harry had been up to the house to fetch a jug of foaming, country, home-brewed ale, such as would really refresh the old man in his toil; for the day had set in excessively hot, and bade fair to become worse--if such an expression is not a contradiction. So Harry took the cool jug up to the old man, but "No! he didn't want beer!"

But he did, though he would not own to it, and what was more, he wanted coaxing; and until he was coaxed, Sam growled away as much as ever, and weeded his onions.

"I say, Sam," said Harry, with a knowing grin upon his countenance, and pushing the jug just under the old man's nose, "I say, how good it smells!"

Sam couldn't help it, he got a good whiff of the foaming ale in his nostrils, and he surrendered, sighed, and stretched out his hand for the jug, and then took such a hearty draught, that it seemed as though he never wanted to breathe again.

"Ha-a-a-a," said Sam at last, with a comical look at Harry.

"Shall I fetch you the wedges, Sam?" said Harry.

"Eh?" said Sam.

"Shall I fetch the wedges?" said Harry again.

Sam did not answer for a minute, for his face was buried in the beer jug; but when he took it away again, he gave another sigh, wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, and then said in a very different tone of voice to the one he had spoken in before--

"Well, I 'spose you may as well."

So the wedges and the great mallet were soon fetched, when they all went off to the fallen willow, which soon gave way to the blows bestowed upon it, and displayed a large hollow containing the papery nest of the wasps.

Fred gazed with astonishment at the curious structure, with its innumerable cells, many of which contained the grubs mentioned in connection with the fishing excursion. The poor wasps were lying dead by the hundred, and were shaken out, brushed into a heap, and then buried by Sam, who seemed to have an idea that, if this latter process were not attended to, they would most probably come to life again. There was no fear of that, however, for the suffocating had been most effectually performed, and not a living wasp was visible.

By means of a little careful cutting, the nest was removed from the hollow tree almost entire, and, without remembering to say "thank you" to old Sam, the boys carried the nest up to the house, and then went in search of their worms. Harry soon fetched a fork, and Philip carried the moss-bag, while Fred, who hardly liked to touch the wriggling, "nasty things," as he called them, looked on.

Now Fred was not much of a student of nature after all, or he would not have called worms "nasty things," but have taken more notice of them as they were turned out of their damp bed, and seen that they were clothed with a skin whose surface reflected colours of prismatic hue, as bright and perfect as those seen upon some pearly shells. He would have seen how wonderfully the worms were constructed for the fulfilment of their apportioned position in the animal kingdom; how, without legs, or the peculiar twist of the snake, they crept swiftly over the ground by means of their many-ringed bodies; and also learned that, by their constant tunnelling of the ground, they prevented the water that sank from the surface from lying stagnant amidst the roots of the trees, and thus rotting them, but enabled it to fertilise larger spaces. Then, too, by their peculiar habit of drawing down dead leaves and straws, and small twigs, how all these rotted beneath the surface, and helped to renew the strength of the earth. Their casts, too, those peculiar little heaps which they throw up at the mouth of their dwellings, formed another source of fertility to the earth, by bringing up from beneath the surface unspent soil, and spreading it upon the top.

However, I must say, that I believe the boys thought of nothing else then, but of getting the finest red worms, and those marked with yellow rings round the body, as being especial favourites with the perch at the great lake.

At last a sufficiency had been obtained and put on one side in a cool place; and now a tin box with a pierced lid was brought out half filled with sand, and the boys started off to the village butcher's, to get some gentles or maggots. This time they did not choose the path by Water Lane, as on the morning when they went to buy the new water-bottle, but strolled round by the road, talking earnestly of the sports of the following day. Fred listened very attentively as they trudged along, and rather strange were the ideas he had stored up respecting the big lake by the time they reached the butcher's; it contained fish of wonderful size--monsters, which always lay snugly at the bottom of deep holes beneath overhanging trees--such profoundly deep holes! and when, by a wonderful chance, one of these enormous fellows was hooked, down he went to the bottom and struck his tail into the mud, so that it was impossible to draw him out, and then of course the line broke.

"Ah," Harry said, "there were wonderful fish in that great clear-watered lake, with its bright gurgling stream, that came dashing down from the hills, and entered one end to leave it at the other in a cascade, that went plashing down the mossy stones, and along in a chain of streamlets and pools through the dark recesses of the wood, till it joined the river half a mile below. There never could have been such beautiful golden-scaled carp anywhere else, nor such finely-marked perch; while, as for eels, they were enormous. The pike, too, were said to be so large and so tame, that they would come to the side to be fed, and therefore would have been easy to capture; but his lordship forbade any one pike-fishing in his lake, this being a luxury he retained for himself, except on special occasions, when he invited a friend to join him."

By listening to such a glowing account of the place, Fred's mind grew so excited that he would have liked to have started at once for the lake, and feasted his eyes upon the wonders; but the butcher's was now reached, and the fat dame in the shop having been told of the cause of their visit, "Willum," the boy, was called, who armed himself with a skewer, and then took the lads to a vile-smelling shed, where lay a heap of sheepskins and a bullock's hide, and from the insides of these, and, by poking out from amongst tendons of an old shin bone, the little tin box was soon filled with the great, fat, white maggots, the end of whose life, the beginning, and the middle, and all the rest of it, seemed to be to keep continually in motion with one incessant wriggle. The boy was recompensed with twopence, which he acknowledged by a tug at his greasy hair with his dirty fingers; and then a visit was paid to the shop, where Harry bought a sixpenny ball of twine, and three sheets of white and blue tea paper for some particular purpose, which Philip seemed to be alive to, but which they would not reveal to their cousin until they returned home.

Only one more visit had to be paid, and that was to a pretty whitewashed and thatched cottage, standing in its little garden, which teemed with fruit and flowers,--bright crimson Prince of Wales's feathers, cockscombs, stocks, wallflowers, and roses; while gooseberries and currants were bending the trees down to the earth with the weight heaped upon the boughs. The window of this cottage was decorated with about half a dozen glass jars, wherein reposed, in all their sticky richness, the toffee, lemon stick, and candy which old Mrs Birch used to make for the delectation of the boys and girls round. She had no brilliantly-coloured sweets; no sticks veined with blue, green, yellow, and red upon pure white ground; no crystallised drops, or those of clear rose-colour, for all her "suckers," as they were called in the neighbourhood, were home-made, and she used to show all her customers the golden bright brass pan which hung upon the wall by the fire, as the one in which all her succulent sweets were made. And where indeed were there such others? Even town-bred Fred, who had feasted on Parisian bonbons, and made himself ill by eating strange fruits off Christmas-trees, owned to the purity and delectability of old Mrs Birch's "butterscotch;" while, as to the brown lemon stick, it was beyond praise. Capital customers were the boys to the dame, who was a wonderful business-like old body in her spotted blue print dress, and clean white muslin handkerchief pinned tightly over her neck; and she told the boys in confidence what a wonderfully extended trade she might do if she gave credit; but how determined she was never to carry on business except upon ready-money principles; which had been her intention ever since William, the butcher's boy, ran up a score of tenpence three-farthings,--a score that had never been paid to that day, and, what was more, the old lady expected that it never would be.

The boys then returned in a state of cloyey stickiness, and very soon finished their preparations for the following day; and at last, by dint of coaxing, Philip persuaded Cook to make a little paste; Harry borrowed the housemaid's scissors, and then obtained from the tool-shed a couple of straight laths. These he fashioned to his required size, and then, by means of a piece of waxed twine, securely bound one to the other in the form of a Latin cross, the upright limb being about eight inches longer than the others. These were now kept in their places by a tightly-tied string passing from one extremity to the other of the limbs of the cross; and then by means of a loop of string the whole was balanced, and found to be equal in weight as far as the two side limbs of the cross were concerned.

"Why, you are going to make a kite," said Fred.

"To be sure we are," said Harry.

"But the top ought to be round, and not made like that. That won't be half a kite."

"Won't it?" said Harry: "it will be more than that, for it will be a whole one."

"But it won't fly," said Fred.

"Fly!" said Philip. "It will fly twice as well as your stupid London-made kites; you see if it don't."

Harry was not a bit disturbed by his cousin's criticism, but continued his job to the end, pasting away in the most spirited manner, till he had made a very respectable-looking kite, half blue and half white, which he then stood on one side to dry, just as the dinner-bell rang.

Directly after dinner the boys set to work to make a tail for the kite, and also fitted it with wings--Fred being employed meanwhile in winding the string off the ball on to a stick, and joining any pieces that might exist, in case of an accident when the kite was up, as it would have been no joke for it to have broken loose. But Fred was not very well up in his task, and somehow or other made a perfect Laocoon of himself with the string, and got at last into a regular tangle, so that fully half an hour was taken up in endeavours to get it right again, which was only done at last with a knife, and at the expense of many yards of string.

At length all was in readiness, and away they went into the fields to fly the machine that had taken so much time to manufacture.

"Now, I shall get it up," said Harry, "because I made it; so you go and hold up down at the bottom of the field."

Away went Philip with the kite, Harry unwinding the string as he went; when they found out that they had got to the wrong way of the wind, and must change places. This was at length done, and then, when all was ready--

"Now then," cried Harry, starting off to run, but Philip held the kite too tightly, and the consequence was the sudden check snapped the string, and down went the kite again upon the grass. The string was tied, and a fresh trial made, and this time with rather better success, for up went the kite at a great rate for thirty or forty yards, when over it tipped, and came down head first, with what Philip termed a "great pitch," to the ground.

"She wants more tail," said Harry; so, by way of balance, two pocket handkerchiefs were tied to the end of the paper tail, and another attempt was made, but still without success, for on starting again, although the kite ascended capitally, yet when a little way in the air, Harry turned round to loosen out more string as he went, and running backwards, went down head over heels upon the grass, let go of the string, and away went the kite in a similar way to Harry, but with the stick of string bobbing along the ground, and every now and then checking the kite by catching in the grassy strands.

Philip and Fred tried hard to cut it off and catch it, but it was of no use, for before they reached the string the kite had lodged in the cedar, and was ignominiously napping about as it hung by its tail.

"Now, there's a bore," said Harry, coming up, puffing and panting; "we shan't get it down without a ladder."

"Pull the string and try," said Philip.

Harry did as his brother said, and pulled, and pulled, and at last set the kite at liberty, but with the loss of half its tail, which hung in the tree, with the two pocket handkerchiefs fluttering about.

"Why, I can climb up and get that," said Harry, "I know."

"Well, why don't you try?" said Fred; for he had lost much of the nervous feeling which used to affect him when anything of this kind was in progress.

"He can't get it," said Philip. "He couldn't get the sparrow's nest."

But Harry stripped off his jacket, and, by means of a lift from Fred, got upon one of the great horizontal boughs, and soon contrived to reach the one to which the kite tail was fluttering. But Harry was at the thick end, by the tree trunk, and the tail was twenty feet further off, at the thin end; and, as those who have tested the wood in their lead pencils well know, cedar is very brittle. Now, Harry was no coward, but he knew that he would be laughed at if he did not succeed, so, in spite of the danger, he prepared to creep along the branch, a very awkward thing to do from the numbers of small projecting twigs, and the prickly nature of the spiny leaves. Still he persevered, and crept along a foot at a time, and nearer and nearer to the kite tail, till at last the branch began to bend terribly, bringing his feet almost in contact with the bough below him. Still he went on, and stretching forth his hand snapped off the twig which held the kite tail, and threw it down.

"Snip--snap--crish--crash--hurry--rustle--bump--bump--Bump!" went a noise; and, in less time than it takes to tell it, down came Harry, fully twenty feet, on to the grass at his brother's and cousin's feet, where he remained, looking very white, frightened, and confused; when all at once he got up, and making a wry face, said--

"There, I told you I could get it."

Poor Harry! He was much quicker in his descent than ascent, for the branch upon which he sat had snapped in two and let him down from bough to bough of the thickly-limbed tree till he bumped on the last, which was not above five feet from the ground, and at its extremities almost touched. It was a most fortunate thing that he was not injured seriously; but a few bruises and scratches were the full extent of the damages done to his skin, though his trousers and shirt told a very different tale.

"There," said Harry again, rubbing the green off his trousers, "I told you I could get the tail, didn't I?"

His companions both acquiesced in the ability, but did not seem to admire the plan of execution any more than Harry, who walked with a kind of limp, and contented himself with holding the kite up when the repairs were completed, and letting Philip run with the string, which he did so successfully that the kite shot up into the air and seemed to be most evenly balanced, for it rose and rose as the string was slowly let out, till it attained a great height, and then seemed to be quite stationary in that soft and gentle breeze; but all the while pulling hardly at the string as though alive, and desirous to fly away and escape to some far-off region--though its destination would most probably have been the first tree, or, escaping that, the ground some quarter of a mile further on.

The boys sat down in the long grass, and took it in turns to hold the stick, amusing themselves by sending disks of paper up to the kite as messengers,--watching the paper circles as they skimmed lightly along the string. But they were very untrustworthy messengers as a rule, for some of them stopped half, quarter, or three-quarters of the distance up the string, sometimes for a long time, until an extra puff of wind started them again, and, what was worst of all, they none of them brought back any person.

They were sitting down, dreamily watching the kite and the great white silvery clouds floating across the blue sky, looking like mountains in some far-off land; some with snowy peaks, some with deep valleys; but all with a background of that deep clear blue so little noticed by us because so frequently to be seen. All at once came from the field on the right, rising and falling, now apparently close at hand, then as though far-off, a peculiar cry--

"Creek--creek; creek--creek," for about a dozen times, when there was a pause. Then again, the peculiarly harsh creaking cry was heard.

"There's an old meadow-crake," said Harry, who was holding the kite: "let's go and hunt him up; perhaps we could catch it."

"But who's to hold the kite?" said Philip.

"Put the stick in the ground, and leave it," said Harry, at once setting to work to put his project into execution, by thrusting one end of the stick to which the string was tied deeply into a crack in the ground.

"That won't be safe," said Fred, trying the stick.

"Oh yes, it will," said Harry, giving it a stamp on the top with his foot; "come along."

"Creek--creek," sang the landrail or meadow-crake, apparently a quarter of a mile off.

"Come on, boys," said Harry again, running off with a half limp, closely followed by Philip and Fred.

"Creek--creek," said the landrail, far enough down, away from where it had been heard at first.

"There's an old stupid," said Philip; "why, where are you?" he continued.

"Creek--creek; creek--creek," said the landrail again, as though just over the hedge, and not more than twenty yards from them.

"Here's a gap," said Harry, creeping through the hedge; "look sharp; we'll have him."

Philip and Fred crept through, and stood with Harry, looking for the bird they were to catch; but all was silent, except the hum of the insects amidst the hedge flowers.

"Now, there's an artful thing," said Philip.

"Creek--creek; creek--creek," came from the bottom of the field again.

"He's down at the bottom," said Harry, running along by the hedgerow toward the bottom of the field.

"Creck-creck; creek-creek," said the bird again, and away started Philip in the opposite direction.

"Creek--creek; creek--creek," said the bird again, close at hand.

"Why, I shall catch it," said Fred to himself, for he had stayed behind; and now started off into the middle of the field in quest of the mysterious stranger.

"Creek--creek; creek--creek; creek--creek," cried the bird, apparently here, there, and everywhere, but always invisible; and up and down, and round and round, ran the boys, until they all stood together at last, wiping the perspiration from their faces, and fanning themselves with their caps; while the provoking "Creek-creek" kept on as bad as ever for a while, and then all at once stopped; and, though they waited and listened attentively for a long while, not another sound could they hear.

"Ain't it funny," said Philip, "that you never can tell where those things are?"

"I think they must run very fast through the grass, so as to keep seeming to be in different places," said Harry.

"Perhaps there's more than one," said Fred; "and they keep calling to one another."

"Ah! perhaps there may be; but I think there's only one. Did you ever read the 'Boys' Country Book,' Fred? It's the jolliest book that was ever written, ever so much better than 'Sandford and Merton.' There's a bit in it about some boys playing truant from school, and they go hunting after a corncrake, as they call it there, and get into no end of trouble, and jump over a hedge into a garden, and break the glass, and get taken before a magistrate. Oh! I did like that book so. Phil and I always have had a hunt after the corncrakes since we read that; but we don't get taken before the magistrates for it."

The lads now returned towards their play-field to let the kite down, for it was growing towards tea-time; but they walked along, very slowly, for they were hot and tired with their exertions. They were walking along by the hedge-side, when something took Harry's attention, and made him leap over the great bed of nettles, which rose from the ditch, to the further bank.

"Look here, boys," he shouted; "here's a jolly nest, full of eggs; only look."

The others were at his side in a moment, and, sure enough, Harry had found a nest in the bottom of the hedge worth finding, for it was the nest of one of the hens, which had been laying astray till there were fifteen eggs collected together, from which the old truant no doubt meant to have a fine brood of chickens; and perhaps would have done so but for Harry's discovery.

The eggs were put in Fred's handkerchief, for Harry's and Philip's were left a hundred yards high in the air, when they went in chase of the meadow-crake; and then they went across the field to where the kite stick was left. They were at first too intent upon the eggs,--which they counted three or four times over,--to think of the kite; but when they did, and came to look, _the stick was gone_; the string was gone; The Kite Was Gone! There was no mistake about it; and though, as a matter of course, if the stick went, the string and kite must go too, yet the boys seemed to make the discovery in the above order, and thus have I recorded the facts.

"It's blown away," said Fred; "let's go and find it;" and off he started in the teeth of the wind.

"What's the good of that?" said Philip, shouting after his cousin; "it will be this way."

Fred returned as hard as he could; and off the boys started in, as nearly as possible, a line with the direction in which they left the kite flying. Every now and then they had to make a deviation, but still they persevered, looking into every garden, peering into every tree, till they were about a mile from home. Nobody had seen the kite, nor yet heard of it; so nothing remained but to trudge wearily back--hot, fagged, and low-spirited, for, as Fred said, "It was such a beauty!"

"And then there were our two little white silk handkerchiefs," said Philip.

"And all that great ball of string," said Harry.

And then they trudged on again in silence.

"Oh! do carry these eggs a bit, somebody," said Fred; "they are so heavy."

But they were not so heavy as they were at first, for Fred had managed to give them a rap up against something, and broken two or three,--the rich yolks having filtered through the handkerchief, and left only the shells behind.

"Yah!" said Harry, as he took hold of the handkerchief, and placed one hand underneath to steady it while he got fast hold. "Yah! how nasty," he said, holding up his sticky hand, and then rubbing it upon the grass.

In spite of the disappointment they had just met with, they all laughed heartily at Harry and the broken eggs, and soon after turned into the gate, and went in at the side-door--hurrying in, for it was past tea-time; when the boys stared, for the first thing that met their gaze upon entering the hall was the blue and white kite, with the ball of string neatly wound up, and the tail arranged carefully from top to bottom, and all leaning up against the wall as though it had never been used. The cheer the boys gave at the discovery brought out Mr and Mrs Inglis, when it came out that the Squire had strolled into the field to speak to the boys, and found the kite flying itself, with the breeze rather on the increase; and not seeing anybody, and at the same time thinking the kite might break loose, he had wound it in, and taken it with him to the house. As may be supposed, the tired and dispirited feeling that oppressed the boys left them in a moment; and then they displayed the riches of the nest they had found in the bottom of the hedge, of course making exception of the three eggs Master Fred had demolished during their search for the kite. _

Read next: Chapter 18. A Day's Fishing At The Lake

Read previous: Chapter 16. Up The Camp Hill

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