The Rainbow

Gradually the young ones were captured, and nightdresses

finally removed, ready for the clean Sunday shirt. But before

the Sunday shirt was slipped over the fleecy head, away darted

the naked body, to wallow in the sheepskin which formed the

parlour rug, whilst the mother walked after, protesting sharply,

holding the shirt like a noose, and the father's bronze voice

rang out, and the naked child wallowing on its back in the deep

sheepskin announced gleefully: "I'm bading in the sea, mother."

"Why should I walk after you with your shirt?" said the

mother. "Get up now."

"I'm bading in the sea, mother," repeated the wallowing,

naked figure.

"We say bathing, not bading," said the mother, with her

strange, indifferent dignity. "I am waiting here with your

shirt."

At length shirts were on, and stockings were paired, and

little trousers buttoned and little petticoats tied behind. The

besetting cowardice of the family was its shirking of the garter

question.

"Where are your garters, Cassie?"

"I don't know."

"Well, look for them."

But not one of the elder Brangwens would really face the

situation. After Cassie had grovelled under all the furniture

and blacked up all her Sunday cleanliness, to the infinite grief

of everybody, the garter was forgotten in the new washing of the

young face and hands.

Later, Ursula would be indignant to see Miss Cassie marching

into church from Sunday school with her stocking sluthered down

to her ankle, and a grubby knee showing.

"It's disgraceful!" cried Ursula at dinner. "People will

think we're pigs, and the children are never washed."

"Never mind what people think," said the mother superbly. "I

see that the child is bathed properly, and if I satisfy myself I

satisfy everybody. She can't keep her stocking up and no garter,

and it isn't the child's fault she was let to go without

one."

The garter trouble continued in varying degrees, but till

each child wore long skirts or long trousers, it was not

removed.

On this day of decorum, the Brangwen family went to church by

the high-road, making a detour outside all the garden-hedge,

rather than climb the wall into the churchyard. There was no law

of this, from the parents. The children themselves were the

wardens of the Sabbath decency, very jealous and instant with

each other.

It came to be, gradually, that after church on Sundays the

house was really something of a sanctuary, with peace breathing

like a strange bird alighted in the rooms. Indoors, only reading

and tale-telling and quiet pursuits, such as drawing, were

allowed. Out of doors, all playing was to be carried on

unobtrusively. If there were noise, yelling or shouting, then

some fierce spirit woke up in the father and the elder children,

so that the younger were subdued, afraid of being

excommunicated.

The children themselves preserved the Sabbath. If Ursula in

her vanity sang: "Il était un' bergère

Et ron-ron-ron petit patapon," Theresa was sure to cry: "That's not a Sunday song, our Ursula."