Oswald Bastable and Others Part 2

Noel had a poetry stall, where you could pay twopence and get a piece of poetry and a sweet wrapped up in it. We chose sugar almonds, because they are not so sticky.

H. O.'s stall was to be sweets, if he promised on his word of honour as a Bastable only to eat one of each kind.

d.i.c.ky wished to have a stall for mechanical toys and parts of clocks. He has a great many parts of clocks, but the only mechanical toy was his clockwork engine, that was broken ages ago, so he had to give it up, and he couldn't think of anything else. So he settled to help Oswald, and keep an eye on H. O.

Oswald's stall was meant to be a stall for really useful things, but in the end it was just a lumber stall for the things other people did not want. But he did not mind, because the others agreed he should have the entire selling of the Goat, and he racked his young brains to think how to sell it in the most interesting and unusual way. And at last he saw how, and he said:

'He shall be a lottery, and we'll make people take tickets, and then draw a secret number out of a hat, and whoever gets the right number gets the Goat. I wish it was me.'

'We ought to advertise it, though,' d.i.c.ky said. 'Have handbills printed, and send out sandwich-men.'

Oswald inquired at the printers in Greenwich, and handbills were an awful price, and sandwich-men a luxury far beyond our means. So he went home sadly; and then Alice thought of the printing-press. We got it out, and cleaned it where the ink had been upset into it, and mended the broken parts as well as we could, and got some more printers' ink, and wrote the circular and printed it. It was:

SECRET LOTTERY.

EXCEPTIONABLE AND RARE CHANCE.

_An Object of Value--_

'It ought to be object of _virtue_,' said d.i.c.ky. 'I saw it in the old iron and china and picture shop. It was a carved ivory ship, and there was a ticket on it: "Rare Object of Virtue."'

'The Goat's an object, certainly,' Alice said, 'and it's valuable. As for virtue, I'm not so sure.'

But Oswald thought the two V's looked well, and being virtuous is different to being valuable; but, all the same, the Goat might be both when you got to know him really well. So we put it in.

SECRET LOTTERY.

EXCEPTIONABLE AND RARE CHANCE.

_An Object of Value and Virtue_

will be lotteried for on Sat.u.r.day next, at four o'clock. Tickets one or two shillings each, according to how many people want them.

The object is not disclosed till after the Lottery, but it cost a lot of money, and is honestly worth three times as much. If you win it, it is the same as winning money. Apply at Morden House, Blackheath, at 3 o'clock next Sat.u.r.day. Take tickets early to prevent disappointment.

We printed these, and though they looked a bit rum, we had not time to do them again, so we went out about dusk and dropped them in people's letter-boxes. Then next day Oswald, who is always very keen on doing the thing well, got two baking-boards out of the kitchen and bored holes in them with an auger I had, and pasted paper on them, and did on them with a paint-brush and ink the following lines:

SECRET LOTTERY.

OBJECT OF VALUE AND VIRTUE.

_Tickets 1/- and 2/-._

If you win, it will be the same as winning money.

Lottery at Morden House, Blackheath.

Sat.u.r.day at 4. Come at 3.

And he slung the boards round his neck, and tied up his mouth in one of those knitted comforters he despises so much at other times, and, pulling a cap of father's over his bold ears, he got d.i.c.ky to let him out of the side-door. And then the brave boy went right across the heath and three times up and down the village, till those boys that followed him and the Goat home went for him near the corner of Wemyss Road, and he made a fight for it, taking off the boards and using them as shields.

But at last, being far outnumbered, which is no disgrace, he had to chuck the boards and run for it.

Sat.u.r.day was fine. We had hung the greenhouse with evergreens and paper roses that looked almost like real among the green, and Miss Blake let us have some Chinesy-looking curtains to cover over the shelves and staging with. And the gardener let us have a lot of azaleas and things in pots, so that it was all very bowery and flowery.

Alice's stall was the smartest looking, because Miss Blake had let her have all the ribbons and things that were over from the other bazaar.

H. O.'s stall was also nice--all on silver tea-trays, so as not to be stickier than needful.

The poetry stall had more flowers on it than any of the others, to make up for the poetry looking so dull outside. Of course, you could not see the sweet inside the packets till you opened them. Red azaleas are prettier than poetry, I think. I think the tropic lands in 'Westward Ho!' had great trees with flowers like that.

We got the Goat into the stovehouse. He was to be kept a secret till the very last. And by half-past two we were all ready, and very clean and dressed. We had all looked out everything we thought anyone could want to buy, and that we could spare, and some things we could not, and most of these were on Oswald's table--among others, several boxes of games we had never cared about; some bags of marbles, which n.o.body plays now; a lot of old books; a pair of braces with wool-work on them, that an aunt once made for Oswald, and, of course, he couldn't wear them; some bags of odd b.u.t.tons for people who like sewing these things on; a lot of foreign stamps, gardening tools, d.i.c.ky's engine, that won't go, and a stuffed parrot, but he was moth-eaten.

About three our friends began to come, Mrs. Leslie, and Lord Tottenham, and Albert's uncle, and a lot of others. It was a very grand party, and they admired the bazaar very much, and all bought things. Mrs. Leslie bought the engine for ten shillings, though we told her honestly it would never go again, and Albert's uncle bought the parrot, and would not tell us what he wanted it for. The money was put on a blue dish, so that everyone could see how it got on, and our hearts were full of joy as we saw how much silver there was among the pennies, and two or three gold pieces too. I know now how the man feels who holds the plate at the door in church.

Noel's poetry stall was much more paying than I thought it would be. I believe n.o.body really likes poetry, and yet everyone pretends they do, either so as not to hurt Noel's feelings, or because they think well-brought-up people ought to like poetry, even Noel's. Of course, Macaulay and Kipling are different. I don't mind them so much myself.

Noel wrote a lot of new poetry for the bazaar. It took up all his time, and even then he had not enough new stuff to wrap up all the sugar almonds in. So he made up with old poetry that he'd done before.

Albert's uncle got one of the new ones, and said it made him a proud man. It was:

'How n.o.ble and good and kind you are To come to Victor A. Plunkett's Bazaar.

Please buy as much as you can bear, For the sufferer needs all you can possibly spare.

I know you are sure to take his part, Because you have such a n.o.ble heart.'

Mrs. Leslie got:

'The rose is red, the violet's blue, The lily's pale, and so are you.

Or would be if you had seen him fall Off the top of the ladder so tall.

Do buy as much as you can stand, And lend the poor a helping hand.'

Lord Tottenham, though, only got one of the old ones, and it happened to be the 'Wreck of the _Malabar_.' He was an admiral once. But he liked it. He is a nice old gentleman, but people do say he is 'excentric.'

Father got a poem that said:

'Please turn your eyes round in their sockets, And put both your hands in your pockets; Your eyes will show you things so gay, And I hope you'll find enough in your pockets to pay For the things you buy.

Good-bye!'

And he laughed and seemed pleased; but when Mrs. Morrison, Albert's mother, got that poem about the black beetle that was poisoned she was not so pleased, and she said it was horrid, and made her flesh creep.

You know the poem. It says:

'Oh, beetle, how I weep to see Thee lying on thy poor back: It is so very sad to see You were so leggy and black.

I wish you were crawling about alive again, But many people think this is nonsense and a shame.'

Noel _would_ recite, no matter what we said, and he stood up on a chair, and everyone, in their blind generousness, paid sixpence to hear him.

It was a long poem of his own about the Duke of Wellington, and it began:

'Hail, faithful leader of the brave band Who went to make Napoleon understand He couldn't have everything his own way.

We taught him this on Waterloo day.'

I heard that much; but then he got so upset and frightened no one could hear anything till the end, when it says:

'So praise the heroes of Waterloo, And let us do our duty like they had to do.'