The Wouldbegoods: Being the Further Adventures of the Treasure Seekers

with this at all. In London, or at any rate Lewisham, nothing happens unless you make it happen; or if it happens it doesn't happen to you, and you don't know the people it does happe

nd doing things with animals, are much better sport than fishmongering or bakering or oil-shopping, and those sort of things

that only wanted a washer, and a whole handful of screws to do what we liked with. We screwed the back door up with the screws, I remember, one night when Eliza was out without leave. There was an awful row. We did not mean to get her into trouble. We only thought

up very good, and perhaps marry missionaries. I am glad Osw

ll enough to have gone to the North Pole or the Equator either. They said they did not mind the first time, because they like to keep themselves clean; it is another of their queer ways. And they said they had had a better time than us. (It was only a clergyman and his wife who called, and hot cakes for tea.) The second time they said they were l

her tapery fingers lightly through her fair tresses, "how sad it is-is it not?-to see abl

gentleness, at the group of youths and maidens who sat b

ot, even now, at the eleventh hour, turn to account these wasted liv

g, dear sister," replied the clever

e these books. I wonder how th

ll eating black currants in the orchard

. It's simply silly to waste a day li

d said, '

the begin

One of them is a sort of open overflow pipe from a good-

am that Alice me

discover the sou

o longer buried in that mysteriousness where it lurked undisturbed for such a long ti

cky; 'then we could take an ice-axe, and live o

voted for the river of the ibis and the crocodile. Dicky, H. O., and

an decide as we go.

obody thought the other people's things would be the slightest use. It is sometimes thus even with gr

e shed in the corner of the stableyard where we got the door

, but this is not so, especially when you know not whether your exploring party i

ood-axe, the coal hammer,

res, and a pair of old skates he had happened to notice

pade, and a trowel, and had also obtained-I k

a butterfly net and a box with a cork in it, a tennis ball, if we happened to want to play rounders in the pauses of expl

ot late, a pair of scissors and needle and

ll table in the dining-room, so that we could make all the

r mind entirely on grub. Nor

ould raise from the ground, so we decided not to take it, but only the best-selected grub. The rest we hid in the straw loft, for there are m

und each other's necks as usual, like a picture o

one of his garters and wouldn't let Alice tie it up with her handkerchief, which the gentle sister was quite willing to do. So it was a rather gloomy expedition t

t only disinclined to do anything the others wanted-and by the time we had followed the stream a little wa

ften paddled in it-in the shallower parts. But now our hearts were set on exploring. At least they ought to have been, but when we got to the place where the stream goes under a wooden sheep-bridge, Dicky cried, 'A camp! a camp!' and we

ts, lemon cheese-cakes, raisins, and cold apple dumplings. It was all very decent, but Oswald could not help fee

nny said, as he lay kicking into the ba

lay and dry them in the sun? Some people did in a book called Foul Play, an

hold of a bit. And at once the heavy gloom that had hung over the explorers became

platters to poor cottagers who are short of the usual so

and then when you turn up the edges they crack. Yet we did not mind the trouble. And we had all got our shoes and stockings off. It is impossible to go on being cross when

on outside. Then they smoothed the thing inside and out with wet fingers, and it was a bowl-at least they said it was. When we'd made a lot of things we set them in the sun to dry, and then it seemed a pity not to do the thi

t to be near, and we decided to co

ss the fields Dicky

's going pre

ing to heaven against the evening sky. A

erhaps it's the kind that burns. I know I've heard

Dicky said with

lt THE feeling-the one that means somethi

slin dress was passing by, and a spark flew on to her

ecause of the corner of the wood

it was as bad nearly as Alice's wild dream. For the wooden fence lead

he ran he said to himself, 'This is no time t

he

however quickly and perseveringly given, would never put the bridge out, and his eventfu

stream and chuck them along. Alice, stand clear, or

got bronchitis. The burning wood hissed and smouldered, and Oswald fell back, almost choked with the smoke. But at once he caught up the other wet jacket and put it on another place, and of course it did the trick as he had known it would do. But it was a long job, and the smoke in

must go

id shortly. He had mea

t at once, because if you have any news like that to tell it onl

that, because I am sure he must have been sorry for

d not take our apology like a man, but only said he daresayed, just like a woman does. Then he w

ing them names he ought not to. Albert's uncle was away so we got no double slating; and next day we st

al explorers most likely have their ginger-beer in something lighter to carry than stone bottles. Perhaps they have it by the ca

so thirsty we decided to drink the ginger-beer and leave the bottles in a place of conce

ring-place at that part where the stream spreads out like a small

aid. 'A Mr Collins wrote an Ode to t

Satan,' Noel said, 'but I'm not bound t

d. 'Look at "Ruin seize thee, ruthless king!" and all the pieces of poetry about war, and t

tream was broad and shallow at this part, and you could see the stones and gravel at the bottom, and millions of baby fishes, and a sort of skating-spiders walking about on the top of the water. Denny sa

.' And everybody was so hot they agreed joyously, and soon our clothes were tucked up as far

hough laborious, as books about b

m for Polar regions. He had brought the ice-axe (it is called the wood chopper sometimes), and Oswald, ever ready and able to command, set him and Denny to cut

with only one easy to eat cake in. And at last the dam rose to the level of the bank. Then the beavers collected a great heap of clay, and four of them lifted it and dumped it down in the opening where the water was running. It did splash a little, but a tr

t on, and Dicky was so hot he had to take

ows, and at last the banks got steeper and higher, and the trees overhead darkly arched their mys

ly disappeared under a dark stone archway, and however much you stood in the water and

smaller than where

ll guess in a moment

lant proposal met but a cold response. The others sai

to hide their cowardliness behi

that dignified manner, not at all like sul

h the candle. It was not comfortable; the architect of that dark subterranean passage had not imagined anyone would ever be brave enough to lead a band of beavers int

no attention to the groans of his faithful fol

wers cheered as well as they could as they splashed after him. The floor was stone as well as the roof, so

He emerged, and the others too, and they stretched their backs and the word 'krikey' fell from more than one lip. It had indeed been a cramping adventure. Bushes grew close to the mouth of the tunnel

never knew before how cold it was undergroun

e was a turning to the North Pole inside the tunn

ream brought us out from t

n the richest profusion. Such blossoms as the

walk on. There were rushes and reeds and small willows, and it was all tangled over with different sorts of grasses-and pools here and there. We saw no wild beasts, but there were more different kinds of wild flies and beetles than you could believe anybody could bear, and dragon

natural fields. It made you want to tear all your clothes off a

the boots because

ld be to go home the same way we came; and he point

ask for any credit for it. So we sloshed along, scratching our legs with the brambles, and the water squelched in our

r and hotter, and the dews of agony stood in beads on our brows and rolled down our noses and off our chins. And the flies buzzed, and th

the Nile we've discovered.

ices! I expect Oswald wishes

ea, but he knows that leaders have other duties besides just leading. One is to

laces. Denny's feet hurt him, because when he was a beaver his stockings had dropped out of his pock

ame to a pond,

s pad

for the boy, and generally he backs him up, but just now

ot! co

ill turn if they are hot enough, and if their feet

tiny and did not say who

nd can make allowances. So Denny took off his boots and went int

muddy,' said his

as cool as the water, and so soft, it squeeze

ut, and kept asking Os

ld doing this; or it may have been becau

e unseen influence, or the b

othes very wet indeed, and altogether you would have thought his was a most envious and

better-' when he gave a blood-pierc

Denny screamed, but he knew it could not be an old meat tin in this qu

is screams, and he splashed towards the bank. Oswald went into the water and caught hold of him and helped him out. It is true that Oswald had

ere. He had read about them in a book called Magnet Stories, where there was a girl called Theodosia, and she could play brilliant trebles on the piano in duets, but the other girl knew all about leeches which is much more useful and golden deedy. Oswald tried to pull th

I do? Oh, it does hurt! Oh, oh!

t let me take them off you'll j

the two struggled on towards the others, who were coming back, attracted by Denny's yells. He did not stop howling for a moment, except to breathe. N

ere the telegraph wires were-was interested by his howls, and came acros

up and carried him under one arm, where Denny went

erer to the cottage where he lived with his aged mother; and then Oswald found that what he had forgotten about the leeches was SALT. The young

ed Denny home on his back, after his legs had been bandage

gh such a long distance by the w

glad he had the two half-crowns Albert's uncle gave him, as well as his own good act. But I am no

urce of the Nile (or North Pole). If you do, it o

having our tea, with raspberries and white currants, which we richly needed after our tor

ind that makes you look at each other when the grown-up has gone out, and you are silent, wi

all that time, of course, and we thought we might as well finish the raspberries and white currants. We kept some for Albe

re the look that means bed,

white-hot iron, which is something

n. What on earth posse

proud tones. He did not see as we did

lsters. Your dam stopped the stream; the clay you took for it left a channel through which it has run down and ruined about seven pounds' worth of

othing else to say, only Alice add

bed and it's two hundred lines to-morrow, and the line is-"Beware of Being Beavers an

ough annoyed, he was not

re sunset on the morrow. That night, just as

s

etorted h

swald went on, 'it does show it

ght, the weary beavers (or explorer