"I've took a lot of trouble
over her and she goes and makes me feel sick with chocolates."
Jumble wagged his tail, sympathetically.
CHAPTER VIII
THE MAY KING
William was frankly bored. School always bored him. He disliked facts,
and he disliked being tied down to detail, and he disliked answering
questions. As a politician a great future would have lain before him.
William attended a mixed school because his parents hoped that
feminine influence might have a mellowing effect upon his character.
As yet the mellowing was not apparent. He was roused from his
day-dreams by a change in the voice of Miss Dewhurst, his form
mistress. It was evident that she was not talking about the exports of
England (a subject in which William took little interest) any longer.
"Children," she said brightly. "I want to have a little May Queen for
the first of May. The rest of you must be her courtiers. I want you
all to vote to-morrow. Put down on a piece of paper the name of the
little girl you think would make the sweetest little Queen, and the
rest of you shall be her swains and maidens."
"We're goin' to have a May Queen," remarked William to his family at
dinner, "an' I'm goin' to be a swain."
His interest died down considerably when he discovered the meaning of
the word swain.
"Isn't it no sort of animal at all?" he asked indignantly.
"Well, I'm not going to be in it, then," he said when he heard that it
was not.
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