“Down too, down at your own fireside,
With the evil tongue and the evil ear,
For each is at war with mankind.”

Tennyson’s Maud.

Aunt Judy had gone to the nursery wardrobe to look over some clothes, and the little ones were having a play to themselves. As she opened the door, they were just coming to the end of an explosive burst of laughter, in which all the five appeared to have joined, and which they had some difficulty in stopping. No. 4, who was a biggish girl, had giggled till the tears were running over her cheeks; and No. 8, in sympathy, was leaning back in his tiny chair in a sort of ecstasy of amusement.

The five little ones had certainly hit upon some very entertaining game.

They were all (boys and girls alike) dressed up as elderly ladies, with bits of rubbishy finery on their heads and round their shoulders, to imitate caps and scarfs; the boys’ hair being neatly parted and brushed down the middle; and they were seated in form round what was called “the Doll’s Table,” a concern just large enough to allow of a small crockery tea-service, with cups and saucers and little plates, being set out upon it.

“What have you got there?” was all Aunt Judy asked, as she went up to the table to look at them.

“Cowslip-tea,” was No. 4’s answer, laying her hand on the fat pink tea-pot; and thereupon the laughing explosion went off nearly as loudly as before, though for no accountable reason that Aunt Judy could divine.

“It’s so good, Aunt Judy, do taste it!” exclaimed No. 8, jumping up in a great fuss, and holding up his little cup, full of a pale-buff fluid, to Aunt Judy.

“You’ll have everything over,” cried No. 4, calling him to order; and in truth the table was not the steadiest in the world.

So No. 8 sat down again, calling out, in an almost stuttering hurry, “You may keep it all, Aunt Judy, I don’t want any more.”

But neither did Aunt Judy, after she had given it one taste; so she put the cup down, thanking No. 8 very much, but pulling such a funny face, that it set the laugh going once more; in the middle of which No. 4 dropped an additional lump of sugar into the rejected buff-coloured mixture, a proceeding which evidently gave No. 8 a new relish for the beverage.

Aunt Judy had got beyond the age when cowslip-tea was looked upon as one of the treats of life; and she had not, on the other hand, lived long enough to love the taste of it for the memory’s sake of the enjoyment it once afforded.

Not but what we are obliged to admit that cowslip-tea is one of those things which, even in the most enthusiastic days of youth, just falls short of the absolute perfection one expects from it.

Even under those most favourable circumstances of having had the delightful gathering of the flowers in the sweet sunny fields—the picking of them in the happy holiday afternoon—the permission to use the best doll’s tea-service for the feast—the loan of a nice white table-cloth—and the present of half-a-dozen pewter knives and forks to fancy-cut the biscuits with—nay, even in spite of the addition of well-filled doll’s sugar-pots and cream-jugs—cowslip-tea always seems to want either a leetle more or a leetle less sugar—or a leetle more or a leetle less cream—or to be a leetle more or a leetle less strong—to turn it into that complete nectar which, of course, it really is.

On the present occasion, however, the children had clearly got hold of some other source of enjoyment over the annual cowslip-tea feast, besides the beverage itself; and Aunt Judy, glad to see them so safely happy, went off to her business at the wardrobe, while the little ones resumed their game.

“Very extraordinary, indeed, ma’am!” began one of the fancy old ladies, in a completely fancy voice, a little affected, or so. “Most extraordinary, ma’am, I may say!”

(Here there was a renewed giggle from No. 4, which she carefully smothered in her handkerchief.)

“But still I think I can tell you of something more extraordinary still!”

The speaker having at this point refreshed his ideas by a sip of the pale-coloured tea, and the other ladies having laughed heartily in anticipation of the fun that was coming, one of them observed:—

“You don’t say so, ma’am—” then clicked astonishment with her tongue against the roof of her mouth several times, and added impressively, “Pray let us hear!”

“I shall be most happy, ma’am,” resumed the first speaker, with a graceful inclination forwards. “Well!—you see—it was a party. I had invited some of my most distinguished friends—really, ma’am, fashionable friends, I may say, to dinner; and, ahem! you see—some little anxiety always attends such affairs—even—in the best regulated families!”

Here the speaker winked considerably at No. 4, and laughed very loudly himself at his own joke.

“Dear me, you must excuse me, ma’am,” he proceeded. “So, you see, I felt a little fatigued by my morning’s exertions, (to tell you the truth, there had been no end of bother about everything!) and I retired quietly up-stairs to take a short nap before the dressing-bell rang. But I had not been laid down quite half an hour, when there was a loud knock at the door. Really, ma’am, I felt quite alarmed, but was just able to ask, ‘Who’s there?’ Before I had time to get an answer, however, the door was burst open by the housemaid. Her face was absolute scarlet, and she sobbed out:—

“‘Oh, ma’am, what shall we do?’

“‘Good gracious, Hannah,’ cried I, ‘what can be the matter? Has the soot come down the chimney? Speak!’

“‘It’s nothing of that sort, ma’am,’ answered Hannah, ‘it’s the cook!’

“‘The cook!’ I shouted. ‘I wish you would not be so foolish, Hannah, but speak out at once. What about Cook?’

“‘Please, m’m, the cook’s lost!’ says Hannah. ‘We can’t find her!’

“‘Your wits are lost, Hannah, I think,’ cried I, and sent her to tidy the rooms while I slipt downstairs to look for the cook.

“Fancy a lost cook, ma’am! Was there ever such a ridiculous idea? And on the day of a dinner-party too! Did you ever hear of such a trial to a lady’s feelings before?”

“Never, I am sure,” responded the lady opposite. “Did you, ma’am?” turning to her neighbour.

But the other three ladies all shook their heads, bit their lips, and declared that they “Never had, they were sure!”

“I thought not!” ejaculated the narrator. “Well, ma’am, I went into the kitchens, the larder, the pantries, the cellars, and all sorts of places, and still no cook! Do you know, she really was nowhere! Actually, ma’am, the cook was lost!”

Shouts of laughter burst forth here; but the lady (who was No. 5) put up his hand, and called out in his own natural tones:—

“Stop! I haven’t got to the end yet!”

“Order!” proclaimed No. 4 immediately, in a very commanding voice, and thumping the table with the head of an old wooden doll to enforce obedience.

And then the sham lady proceeded in the same mincing voice as before:—

“Well!—dear me, I’m quite put out. But however, you see—what was to be done, that was the thing. It wanted only half an hour to dinner-time, and there was the meat roasting away by itself, and the potatoe-pan boiling over. You never heard such a fizzling as it made in your life—in short, everything was in a mess, and there was no cook.

“Well! I basted the meat for a few minutes, took the potatoe-pan off the fire, and then ran up-stairs to put on my bonnet. Thought I, the best thing I can do is to send somebody for the policeman, and let him find the cook. But while I was tying the strings of my bonnet, I fancied I heard a mysterious noise coming out of the bottom drawer of my wardrobe. Fancy that, ma’am, with my nerves in such a state from the cook being lost!”

No. 5 paused, and looked round for sympathy, which was most freely given by the other ladies, in the shape of sighs and exclamations.

“The drawer was a very deep drawer, ma’am, so I thought perhaps the cat had crept in,” continued No. 5. “Well, I went to it to see, and there it was, partly open, with a cotton gown in it that didn’t belong to me. Imagine my feelings at that, ma’am! So I pulled at the handles to get the drawer quite open, but it wouldn’t come, it was as heavy as lead. It was really very alarming—one doesn’t like such odd things happening—but at last I got it open, though I tumbled backwards as I did so; and what do you think, ma’am—ladies—what do you think was in it?”

“The cook!” shrieked No. 4, convulsed with laughter; and the whole party clapped their hands and roared applause.

“The cook, ma’am, actually the cook!” pursued No. 5, “one of the fattest, most poonchy little women you ever saw. And what do you think was the history of it? I kept my up-stairs Pickwick in the corner of that bottom drawer. She had seen it there that very morning, when she was helping to dust the room, and took the opportunity of a spare half-hour to slip up and rest herself by reading it in the drawer. Unluckily, however, she had fallen asleep, and when I got the drawer out, there she lay, and I actually heard her snore. A shocking thing this education, ma’am, you see, and teaching people to read. All the cooks in the country are spoilt!”

Peals of laughter greeted this wonderfully witty concoction of No. 5’s, and the lemon-coloured tea and biscuits were partaken of during the pause which followed.

Aunt Judy meanwhile, who had been quite unable to resist joining in the laugh herself, was seated on the floor, behind the open door of the wardrobe, thinking to herself of certain passages in Wordsworth’s most beautiful ode, in which he has described the play of children,

“As if their whole vocation
Were endless imitation.”

Truly they had got hold here of strange

“Fragments from their dream of human life.”

Where could the children have picked up the original of such absurd nonsense?

Aunt Judy had no time to make it out, for now the mincing voices began again, and she sat listening.

“Have you had no curious adventures with your maids, ma’am?” inquires No. 5 of No. 4.

No. 5 makes an attempt at a bewitching grin as he speaks, fanning himself with a fan which he has had in his hand all the time he was telling his story.

“Well, ladies,” replied No. 4, only just able to compose herself to talk, “I don’t think I have been quite as fortunate as yourselves in having so many extraordinary things to tell. My servants have been sadly common-place, and done just as they ought. But still, once, ladies—once, a curious little incident did occur to me.”

“Oh, ma’am, I entreat you—pray let us hear it!” burst from all the ladies at once.

No. 4 had to bite her lip to preserve her gravity, and then she turned to No. 5—

“The fan, if you please, ma’am!”

The rule was, that the one fan was placed at the disposal of the story-teller for the time, so No. 5 handed it to No. 4, with a graceful bow; and No. 4 waffed it to and fro immediately, and began her account:—

“People are so unscrupulous you see, ladies, about giving characters. It’s really shocking. For my part, I don’t know what the world will come to at last. We shall all have to be our own servants, I suppose. People say anything about anything, that’s the fact! Only fancy, ma’am, three different ladies once recommended a cook to me as the best soup-maker in the country. Now that sounded a very high recommendation, for, of course, if a cook can make soups, she can do anything—sweetmeats and those kind of things follow of themselves. So, ma am, I took her, and had a dinner-party, and ordered two soups, entirely that I might show off what a good cook I had got. Think what a compliment to her, and how much obliged she ought to have been! Well, ma’am, I ordered the two soups, as I said, one white, and the other brown; and everything appeared to be going on in the best possible manner, when, as I was sitting in the drawing-room entertaining the company, I was told I was wanted.

Playing at ladies

“When I got out of the room, there was the man I had hired to wait, and says he:—

“‘If you please, ma’am where are the knives? I can’t find any at all!’

“‘No knives!’ says I. ‘Dear me, don’t come to me about the knives. Ask the cook, of course.’

“‘Please, ma’am, I have asked her, and she only laughed.’

“‘Then,’ said I, ‘ask the housemaid. It’s impossible for me to come out and look for the knives.’

“Well, ladies,” continued No. 4, “would you believe it?—could anyone believe it?—when I sat down to dinner, and began to help the soup, no sooner had the silver ladle (my ladle is silver, ladies) been plunged into the tureen, than a most singular rattling was heard.

“‘William,’ cried I, half in a whisper, to the waiter who was holding the plate, ‘what in the world is this? Surely Cook has not left the bones in?’

“‘Please, ma’am, I don’t know,’ was all the man could say.

“Well—there was no remedy now, so I dipped the ladle in again, and lifted out—oh! ma’am, I know if it was anybody but myself who told you, you wouldn’t believe it—a ladleful of the lost knives! There they were, my best beautiful ivory handles, all in the white soup! And while I was discovering them, the gentleman at the other end of the table had found all the kitchen-knives, with black handles, in the brown soup!

“There never was anything so mortifying before. And what do you think was Cook’s excuse, when I reproached her?

“‘Please, ma’am,’ said she, ‘I read in the Young Woman’s Vademecum of Instructive Information, page 150, that there was nothing in the world so strengthening and wholesome as dissolved bones, and ivory-dust; and so, ma’am, I always make a point of throwing in a few knives into every soup I have the charge of, for the sake of the handles—ivory-handles for white soups, ma’am, and black-handles for the browns!’”

Thunders of applause interrupted Cook’s excuse at this point, and No. 7 was so overcome that he pushed his chair back, and performed three distinct somersets on the floor, to the complete disorganization of his head-dress, which consisted of a turban, from beneath which hung a cluster of false curls.

Turban and wig being replaced, however, and No. 7 reseated and composed, No. 4 proceeded:—

“Cook generally takes them out, she informed me, ladies, before the tureens come to table; ‘but,’ said she, ‘my back was turned for a minute here, ma’am, and that stupid William carried them off without asking if they were ready. It’s all William’s fault, ma’am; and I don’t mean to stay, for I don’t like a place where the man who waits has no tact!’

“Now, ladies,” continued No. 4, “what do you think of that by way of a speech from a cook? And I assure you that a medical man’s wife, to whom I mentioned in the course of the evening what Cook had said about dissolved bones, told me that her husband had only laughed, and said Cook was quite right. So she hired the woman that night herself, and I have been told in confidence since—you’ll not repeat it, therefore, of course, ladies?”

“Of course not!” came from all sides.

“Well, then, I was told that, before the year was out, the family hadn’t a knife that would cut anything, they were so cankered with rust. So much for education and learning to read, as you justly observed, ma’am, before!”

When the emotions produced by this tale had a little subsided, No. 7 was called upon for his experience of maids.

No. 7, with the turban on his head, and a fine red necklace round his throat, said he took very little notice of the maids, but that he once had had a very tiresome little boy in buttons, who was extremely fond of sugar, and always carried the sugar-shaker in his pocket, and ate up the sugar that was in it, and when it was empty, filled it up with magnesia.

“But once,” he added, “ladies, he actually put some soda in. It was at a party, and we had our first rhubarb tart for the season, and the company sprinkled it all over with the soda and began to eat, but they were too polite to say how nasty it was. But, of course, when I was helped I called out. And what do you think the boy in buttons said?”

Nobody could guess, so No. 7 had to tell them.

“He said he had put it in on purpose, because he thought it would correct the acid of the pie. So I said he had best be apprenticed to a doctor; so he went—I dare say, ma’am, it was the same doctor who took your cook—but I never heard of him any more, and I’ve never dared to have a boy in buttons again.”

“A very wise decision, ma’am, I’m sure!” cried Aunt Judy, who came up to the wonderful tea-table in the midst of the last mound of applause. “And now may I ask what game this is that you are playing at?”

“Oh, we’re telling Cook Stories, Aunt Judy,” cried No. 6, seizing her by the arm; “they’re such capital fun! I wish you had heard mine; they were laughing at it when you first came in!”

“It must have been delicious, to judge by the delight it gave,” replied Aunt Judy, smiling, and kissing No. 6’s oddly bedizened up-turned face. “But what I want to know is, what put Cook Stories, as you call them, into your head?”

“Oh! don’t you remember—” and here followed a long account from No. 6 of how, about a week before, the little ones had gone somewhere to spend the day, and how it had turned out a very rainy day, so that they could not have games out of doors with their young friends, as had been expected, but were obliged to sit a great part of the time in the drawing-room, putting Chinese puzzles together into stupid patterns, and playing at fox-and-goose, while the ladies were talking “grown-up conversation,” as No. 6 worded it, among themselves; and, of course, being on their own good behaviour, and very quiet, they could not help hearing what was said. “And, oh dear, Aunt Judy,” continued No. 6, now with both her arms holding Aunt Judy, of whom she was very fond, (except at lesson times!) round the waist, “it was so odd! No. 7 and I did nothing at last but listen and watch them; for little Miss, who sat with us, was shy, and wouldn’t talk, and it was so very funny to see the ladies nodding and making faces at each other, and whispering, and exclaiming, how shocking! how abominable! you don’t say so! and all that kind of thing!”

“Well, but what was shocking, and abominable, and all that kind of thing?” inquired Aunt Judy.

“Oh, I don’t know—things the nurses, and cooks, and boys in buttons did. Almost all the ladies had some story to tell—all the servants had done something or other queer—but especially the cooks, Aunt Judy, there was no end to the cooks. So one day after we came back, and we didn’t know what to play at, I said: ‘Do let us play at telling Cook Stories, like the ladies at —.’ So we’ve dressed up, and played at Cook Stories, ever since. Dear Aunt Judy, I wish you would invent a Cook Story yourself!” was the conclusion of No. 6’s account.

So then the mystery was out. Aunt Judy’s wonderings were cut short. Out of the real life of civilized intelligent society had come those

“Fragments from their dream of human life,”

which Aunt Judy had called absurd nonsense. And absurd nonsense, indeed, it was; but Aunt Judy was seized by the idea that some good might be got out of it.

So, in answer to No. 6’s wish, she said, with a shy smile:—

“I don’t think I could tell Cook Stories half as well as yourself. But if, by way of a change, you would like a Lady Story instead, perhaps I might be able to accomplish that.”

“A Lady Story! Oh, but that would be so dull, wouldn’t it?” inquired No. 6. “You can’t make anything funny out of them, surely! Surely they never do half such odd things as cooks, and boys in buttons!”

“The ladies themselves think not, of course,” was Aunt Judy’s reply.

“Well, but what do you think, Aunt Judy?”

“Oh, I don’t think it matters what I think. The question is, what do cooks and boys in buttons think?”

“But, Aunt Judy, ladies are never tiresome, and idle, and impertinent, like cooks and boys in buttons. Oh! if you had but heard the real Cook Stories those ladies told! I say, let me tell you one or two—I do think I can remember them, if I try.”

“Then don’t try on any account, dear No. 6,” exclaimed Aunt Judy. “I like make-believe Cook Stories much better than real ones.”

“So do I!” cried No. 7, “they’re so much the more entertaining.”

“And not a bit less useful,” subjoined Aunt Judy, with a sly smile.

“Well, I didn’t see much good in the real ones,” pursued No. 7, in a sort of muse.

“Let us tell you another make-believe one, then,” cried No. 6, who saw that Aunt Judy was moving off, and wanted to detain her.

“Then it’s my turn!” shouted No. 8, jumping up, and stretching out his arm and hand like a young orator flushed to his work. And actually, before the rest of the little ones could put him down or stop him, No. 8 contrived to tumble out the Cook Story idea, which had probably been brewing in his head all the time of Aunt Judy’s talk.

It was very brief, and this was it, delivered in much haste, and with all the earnestness of a maiden speech.

“I had a button boy too, and he was a—what d’ye call it—oh, a rascal, that was it;—he was a rascal, and liked the currants in mince-pies, so he took them all out, and ate them up, and put in glass beads instead. So when the people began to ear, their teeth crunched against the beads! Ah! bah! how nasty it was!”

No. 8 accompanied this remark with a corresponding grimace of disgust, and then observed in conclusion:—

“Perhaps he found it in a book, but I don’t know where,” after which he lowered his outstretched arm, smiled, and sat down.

The company clapped applause, and No. 4 especially must have been very fond of laughing, for the glass-bead anecdote set her off again as heartily as ever, and the rest followed in her wake, and while so doing, never noticed that Aunt Judy had slipped away.

They soon discovered it, however, when their mirth began to subside; but before they had time to wonder much, there appeared from behind the door of the wardrobe a figure, which in their secret souls they knew to be Aunt Judy herself, although it looked a great deal stouter, and had a thick-filled cap on its head, a white linen apron over its gown, and a pair of spectacles on its nose. At sight of it they showed signs of clapping again, but stopped short when it spoke to them as a stranger, and willingly received it as such.

Ah! it is one of the sweet features of childhood that it yields itself up so readily to any little surprise or delusion that is prepared for its amusement. No nasty pride, no disinclination to be carried away, no affected indifference, interfere with young children’s enjoyment of what is offered them. They will even help themselves into the pleasant visions by an effort of will; and perhaps, now and then, end by partly believing what they at first received voluntarily as an agreeable make-believe.

If, therefore, after the cook figure of Aunt Judy had seated itself by the doll’s table, and the little ones had looked and grinned at it for some time, hazy sensations began to steal over one or two minds, that this was somehow really a cook, it was all in the natural course of things, and nobody resisted the feeling.

Aunt Judy’s altered voice, and odd, assumed manner, contributed, no doubt, a good deal to the impression.

“Dear, dear! what pretty little darlings you all are!” she began, looking at them one after another. “As sweet as sugar-plums, when you have your own way, and are pleased. Eh, dears? But you don’t think you can take old Cooky in, do you? No, no, I know what ladies and gentlemen, and ladies’ and gentlemen’s young ladies and young gentlemen are, pretty well, dears, I can tell you! Don’t I know all about the shiny hair and smiling faces of the little pets in the parlour, and how they leave parlour-manners behind them sometimes, when they run to the kitchen to Cook, and order her here and there, and want half-a-dozen things at once, and must and will have what they want, and are for popping their fingers into every pie!

“Well, well,” she proceeded, “the parlour’s the parlour, and the kitchen’s the kitchen, and I’m only a cook. But then I conduct myself as Cook, even when I’m in the scullery, and I only wish ladies, and ladies’ young ladies too, would conduct themselves as ladies, even when they come into the kitchen; that’s what I call being honourable and upright. Well, dears, I’ll tell you how I came to know all about it. You see, I lived once in a family where there were no less than eight of those precious little pets, and a precious time I had of it with them. But, to be sure, now it’s past and gone—I can make plenty of excuses for them, poor things! They were so coaxed and flattered, and made so much of, what could be expected from them but tiresome, wilful ways, without any sense?

“‘If your mamma would but put you into the scullery, young miss, to learn to wash plates and scour the pans out, she’d make a woman of you,’ used I to think to myself when a silly child, who thought itself very clever to hinder other people’s work, would come hanging about in the kitchen, doing nothing but teaze and find fault, for that’s what a girl can always do.

“It was very aggravating, you may be sure, dears, (you see I can talk to you quite reasonably, because you’re so nicely behaved;)—it was very aggravating, of course; but I used to make allowances for them. Says I to myself, ‘Cook, you’ve had the blessing of being brought up to hard work ever since you were a babby. You’ve had to earn your daily bread. Nobody knows how that brings people to their senses till they’ve tried; so don’t you go and be cocky, because ladies and gentlemen, and ladies’ and gentlemen’s young ladies and young gentlemen, are not quite so sensible as you are. Who knows but what, if you’d been born to do nothing, you might have been no wiser than them! It’s lucky for you you’re only a cook; but don’t you go and be cocky, that’s all! Make allowances; it’s the secret of life!’

“So you see, dears, I did make allowances; and after the eight little pets was safe in bed till next morning, I used to feel quite composed, and pitiful-like towards them, poor little dears! But certainly, when morning came, and the oldest young master was home for the holidays, it was a trying time for me, and I couldn’t think of the allowances any longer. Either he wouldn’t get up and come down till everyone else had had their breakfast, and so he wanted fresh water boiled, and fresh tea made, and another muffin toasted, and more bacon fried; or else he was up so outrageous early, that he was scolding because there was no hot water before the fire was lit—bless you, he hadn’t a bit of sense in his head, poor boy, not a bit! And how should he? Why, he went to school as soon as he was out of petticoats, and was set to all that Latin and Greek stuff that never puts anything useful into folks’ heads, but so much more chatter and talk; so he came back as silly as he went, poor thing! Dear me, on a wet day, after lesson-time, those boys were like so many crazy creatures. ‘Cook, I must make a pie,’ says one. ‘There’s a pie in the oven already, Master James,’ says I. ‘I don’t care about the pie in the oven,’ says he, ‘I want a pie of my own. Bring me the flour, and the water, and the butter, and all the things—and, above all, the rolling-pin—and clear the decks, will you, I say, for my pie. Here goes!’ And here used to go, my dears, for Master James had no sense, as I told you; and so he’d shove all my pots and dishes away, one on the top of the other; and let me be as busy as I would, and dinner ever so near ready, the dresser must be cleared, and everything must give way to his pie! His pie, indeed—I wish I had had the management of his pie just then! I’d have taught him what it was to come shaking the rolling-pin at the head of a respectable cook, who wanted to get her business done properly, as in duty bound!

“But he wasn’t the only one. There was little Whipper-snapper, his younger brother, squeaking out in another corner, ‘I shan’t make a pie, James, I shall make toffey; it’s far better fun. You’d better come and help me. Where’s the treacle pot, Cook? Cook! I say, Cook! where’s the treacle-pot? And look at this stupid kettle and pan. What’s in the pan, I wonder? Oh, kidney-beans! Who cares for kidney-beans? How can I make toffey, when all these things are on the fire? Stay, I’ll hand them all off!’

“And, sure enough, if I hadn’t rushed from Master James, who was drinking away at my custard out of the bowl, to seize on Whipper-snapper, who had got his hand on the vegetable-pan already, he would have pulled it and the kettle, and the whole concern, off the fire, and perhaps scalded himself to death.

“Then, of course, there comes a scuffle, and Master Whipper-snapper begins to roar, and out comes Missus, who, poor thing, had no more sense in her head than her sons, though she’d never been to school to lose it over Latin and Greek; and, says she, with all her ribbons streaming, and her petticoats swelled out like a window-curtain in a draught—says she:—

“‘Cook! I desire that you will not touch my children!’

“‘As you please, ma’am,’ says I, ‘if you’ll be so good as to stop the young gentlemen from touching my pans, and—’ I was going to say ‘custard,’ but Master James shouts out quite quick:—

“‘Why, I only wanted to make a pie, mamma.’

“‘And I only wanted to make some toffey!’ cries Whipper-snapper; and then mamma answers, like a duchess at court:—

“‘There can’t possibly be any objection, my dears; and I wish, Cook, you would he a little more good-natured to the children;—your temper is sadly against you!’

“And out she sails, ribbons and window-curtains and all; and, says I to myself, as I cooled down, (for the young gentlemen luckily went away with their dear mama,)—says I to myself, ‘It’s a very fine thing, no doubt, to go about in ribbons, and petticoats, and grand clothes; but, if one must needs carry such a poor, silly head inside them, as Missus does, I’d rather stop as I am, and be a cook with some sense about me.’

“I don’t say, my dears,” continued the supposed cook, “that I spoke very politely just then; but who could feel polite, when their dinner had been put back at least half-an-hour over such nonsense as that? Missus used to say the ‘dear boys’ came to the kitchen on a wet day, because they’d got nothing else to do! Nothing else to do! and had learnt Latin and Greek, and all sorts of schooling besides! So much for education, thought I. Why, it would spoil the best lads that ever were born into the world. For, of course, you know if these young gentlemen had been put to decent trades, they’d have found something else to do with their fingers besides mischief and waste. And, dear me, I talk about not having been polite to Missus just then, but now you tell me, dears, what Missus, with all her education, would have said if she’d been in my place, when one young gentleman was drinking her custard, and another young gentleman was pulling her pans on the floor! Do you think she’d have been a bit more polite than I was? Wouldn’t she have called me all the stupid creatures that ever were born, and told the story over and over to all her friends and acquaintance to make them stare, and say there were surely no such simpletons in the world as ladies and gentlemen, and ladies’ and gentlemen’s young ladies and young gentlemen?

“However, I did not go as far as that, because, you see, I had some sense about me, and could make allowances for all the nonsense the poor things are brought up to.”

There was no resisting the twinkle in Aunt Judy’s eye when she came to this point, though it shone through an old pair of Nurse’s spectacles; and the little ones clapped their hands, and declared it was every bit as good as a Cook story, only a great deal better! That twinkle had quite brought Aunt Judy back to them again, in spite of her cook’s attire, and No. 6 cried out:—

“Oh! don’t stop, Aunt Judy! Do go on, Cooky dear! do tell some more! Did you always live in that place, please?”

“There now!” exclaimed Aunt Judy, throwing herself back in the chair, “isn’t that a regular young lady’s question, out and out? Who but a young lady, with no more sense in her head than a pin, would have thought of asking such a thing? Why, miss, is there a joint in the world that can bear basting for ever? No, no! a time comes when it must be taken down, if any good’s to be left in it; and so at the end of three years my basting-time was over, and the time for taking down was come.

“‘Cook,’ says I to myself, ‘you must give in. If you go on with those cherubs (that was their company name, you know) much longer, there won’t be a bit of you left!’ And, sure enough, that very morning, dears, they’d come down upon me with a fresh grievance, and I couldn’t stand it, I really couldn’t! The sweeps had been by four o’clock to the kitchen chimney, and I’d been up and toiling every minute since, and hadn’t had time to eat my breakfast, when in they burst—the young ladies, not the sweeps, dears, I mean:—and there they broke out at once—I hadn’t fed their sea-gulls before breakfast—(a couple of dull-looking grey birds, with big mouths, that had come in a hamper over night as a present to the cherubs;) and it seems I ought to have been up before daylight almost, to look for slugs for them in the garden till they’d got used to the place!

“Oh, these ladies and gentlemen! they’d need know something of some sort to make amends, for there are many things they never know all their life long!

“‘Young ladies,’ says I, ‘I didn’t come here to get meals ready for sea-gulls, but Christian ladies and gentlemen. If the sea-gulls want a cook, your mamma must hire them one on purpose. I’ve plenty to do for her and the family, without looking after such nonsense as that!’

“‘That’s what you always say,’ whimpers the youngest Miss; ‘and you know they don’t want any cooking, but only raw slugs! And you know you might easily look for them, because you’ve got almost nothing to do, because it’s such an easy place, mamma always says. But you’re always cross, mamma says that too, and everybody knows you are, because she tells everybody!’

“When little Miss had got that out, she thought she’d finished me up; and so she had, for when I heard that Missus was so ungenteel as to go talking of what I did, to all her acquaintance, and had nothing better to talk about, I made up my mind that I’d give notice that very day.

“‘Very well, miss,’ says I, ‘your mamma shall soon have something fresh to talk about, and I hope she’ll find it a pleasant change.’

“There was some of them knew what I meant at once, for after they’d scampered off I heard shouts up and down the stairs from one to the other, ‘Cook’s going!’ ‘We shall have a new cook soon!’ ‘What a lark we’ll have with the toffey and the pies! We’ll make her do just as we choose!’

“‘There, now,’ thought I to myself, ‘there’ll be somebody else put down to baste before long. Well, I’m glad my time’s over.’ And thereupon I fell to wishing I was back again in father and mother’s ricketty old cottage, that I’d once been so proud to leave, to go and live with gentlefolks. But, you see, it was no use wishing, for I’d my bread to earn, and must turn out somewhere, let it be as disagreeable as it would. Father and mother were dead, and there was no ricketty cottage for me to go back to, so I wiped my eyes, and told myself to make the best of what had to be.

“Well, dears,” pursued Cooky, after a short pause, during which the little ones looked far more inclined to cry than laugh, “Missus was quite taken aback when she heard I wouldn’t stay any longer.

“‘Cook,’ she said, ‘I’m perfectly astonished at your want of sense in not recognizing the value of such a situation as mine! and as to your complaints about the children, anything more ridiculously unreasonable I never heard! Such superior, well-taught young people, you are not very likely to meet with again in a hurry!’

“‘Perhaps not, ma’am,’ says I, ‘in French, and crochet, and the piano, and Latin, and things I don’t understand, being only a cook. But I know what behaviour is, and that’s what I’m sure the young ladies and gentlemen have never been taught; or if they have, they’re so slow at taking it in, that I think I shall do better with a family where the behaviour-lessons come first!’

“Missus was very angry, and so was I; but at last she said:—

“‘Cook, I shall not argue with you any longer; you know no better, and I suppose I must make allowances for you.’

“‘I’m much obliged to you, ma’am, I’m sure,’ was my answer; ‘it’s what I’ve always done by you ever since I came to the house, and I’ll do it still with pleasure, and think no more of what’s been said.’

“I spoke from my heart, I can tell you, dears, for I felt very sorry for Missus, and thought she was but a lady after all, and perhaps I’d hardly made allowances enough. I’d lost my temper, too, as I knew after she went away. But, you see, while she was there, it was so mortifying to be spoken to as if all the sense was on her side, when I knew it was all on mine, wherever the French and crochet may have been. Well, but the day before I left, I broke down with another of them, as it’s fair that you should know.

“I’d felt very lonely that day, busy as I was, and in the afternoon I took myself into the scullery to give the pans a sort of good-bye cleaning, and be out of everybody’s way. But there, in the midst of it, comes the eldest young gentleman flinging into the kitchen, shouting, ‘Cook! Cook! Where’s Cook?’ as usual. I thought he was after some of his old tricks, and I had been fretting over those pans, thinking what a sad job it was to have no home to go to in the world, so I gave him a very short answer.

“‘Master James,’ says I, ‘I’ve done with nonsense now, I can’t attend to you. You must wait till the next cook comes.’

“But Master James came straight away to the scullery door, and says he, ‘Cook, I’m not coming to teaze. I’ve brought you a needle-book. There, Cook! It’s full of needles. I put them all in myself. Keep it, please.’

“Dear, dear, I can’t forget it yet,” pursued Cook, “how Master James stood on the little stone step of the scullery, with his arm stretched out, and the needle-book that he’d bought for me in his hand. I don’t know how I thanked him, I’m sure; but I had to go back to the sink and wash the dirt off my hands before I could touch the pretty little thing, and then I told him I would keep it as long as ever I lived.

“He laughed, and says he, ‘Now shake hands, Cooky,’ and so we shook hands; and then off he ran, and I went back to my pans and fairly cried. ‘Why, Cook,’ says I to myself, ‘that lad’s got as good a heart as your own, after all. And as to sense and behaviour, they haven’t been forced upon him yet, as they have upon you. Latin’s Latin, and conduct’s conduct, and one doesn’t teach the other; and it’s too bad to expect more of people than what they’ve had opportunity for.’

“Well, dears, that was the rule I always went by, and I’ve been in many situations since—with single ladies, and single gentlemen, and large families, and all; and there was something to put up with in all of them; and they always told me there was a good deal to put up with in me, and perhaps there was. However, it doesn’t matter, so long as Missus and servant go by one rule—to make allowances, and not expect more from people than what they’ve had opportunity for; and, above all, never to be cocky when all the advantage is on their own side. It’s a good rule, dears, and will stop many a foolish word and idle tale, if you’ll go by it.”

Aunt Judy had finished at last, and she took off the old spectacles and laid them on the doll’s table, and paused.

“It is a good rule,” observed No. 4, “and I shall go by it, and not tell real Cook Stories when I grow up, I hope.”

“I love old Cooky,” cried No. 6, getting up and hugging her round the neck; “but is it wrong, Aunt Judy, to tell funny make-believe Cook Stories, like ours?”

“Not at all, No. 6,” replied Aunt Judy. “My private belief is, that if you tell funny make-believe Cook Stories while you’re little, you will be ashamed of telling stupid real ones when you’re grown up.”