"Now, Ellen Smith, what is two and two?" "Four." "Very good. Now we'll have an object lesson. What animal do we get milk from, Janet?" "The cow." "Very good. Now we'll have some geography. Where is the town of--?" "Give us spellin' instead," cried Gladys. "Come out, girl!" and Gladys was punished severely. Then Jean was punished for laughing. "It's my chance o' bein' teacher noo," cried Ellen and Janet at the same time, and a treble scuffle for the strap followed. Janet got it. "Now," she began, "I'll be Mister Macdonald. Put yer hands behind yer backs, and the first one that moves will hear about it!" They sat up like statues. "Now, Jean Broon, you stand up and recite the _Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard_!" And Jean stood up and recited the first verse dramatically. "That'll do. Sit down. Ellen Smith, I want you to say the first verse of Wordsworth's _Ode to the Imitations of Immorality_." "P-Please, sir," tittered Gladys, "the inspector's laughin' like onything!" I laughed immoderately, but it wasn't at Janet's malapropism that I laughed so much. I thought of Mrs. Wilks, the charwoman, who looked after the flat another man and I shared in Croydon. One morning she did not arrive to make the breakfast, and I went out to look for her. I found the old woman--she was sixty-three--standing at the foot of the stairs weeping. "Great Scot!" I cried, "what's the matter?" "My 'usband ain't goin' to allow me to char for you young gentlemen again." "What for?" I asked in amazement. "He ... he accuses me of 'avin' immortal relations wiv you," she sobbed. I hasten to add that her relations with us were not immortal: we sacked her a week later for pinching the cream. "Sorry, Janet," I said at length, "proceed with your Imitations of Immorality, although personally I don't see the need for them; the real thing's good enough for me." "Now," she said, "I'll be Mister Neill now." Annie at once began to sing "Tipperary"; Ellen began to pull Gladys's hair; Jean pretended that she was biting a huge apple ... and the teacher Janet took a cigarette from the box on the table and lit it. "You gross libellers!" I cried, and I chased them out of the bothy. * * * To-night I had a long walk with Margaret. I tried to make her talk, for I want so much to know her views on things. "You talk," she said; "I like to listen." "But," I protested, "I'm always talking to you, and you listen all the time. I want to know what is in that wee head of yours ... although I suppose that I ought to be satisfied with its exterior." "You see," she said slowly and somewhat sadly, "I am not clever; I am only an ordinary farmer's daughter working in the dairy and the fields. If I told you what I was thinking you would not be interested." We walked many yards in silence.