A Transfer Rage at the Silverton’s.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XXV, Issue I, 7 July 1900, Page 46

A Transfer Rage at the Silverton’s.

A Sketch by

A.F.H.

The Silvertons were very subject to crazes. These, while they lasted, absorbed their entire attention from early morn to dewy eve. at which hour they were not infrequently sent to bed for misplaced concentration of energy.

At one time it was marbles. While the marble-fever lasted it was unsafe to cross the hall, for fear of stepping upon, and. displacing, a mysterious thing called an “allep.” A simple circumstance apparently, yet sufficient to call forth frenzied appeals or wild execrations from groups of Silvertons disposed in eccentric attitudes about the floor. followed marbles in quick succession. While guinea-pigs were in it was unusual to meet a Silverton without a pinafore or an armful of sleek, squeaking, brown-and-white quadrupeds, which smelt atrociously. Though I was glad when the guinea-pig was superseded by the innocuous stamp album—provocative of quarrels indeed, but not unsavoury —no one, I think, was pleased when stamps gave way to “transfers.” So limited were my interests in those days that the nature and properties of a “transfer” bad to be demonstrated to me before I became aware of the perennial fount of joy which it afforded its possessor. “Never seeu a ‘transfer!’” exclaimed Jim increduously, the first evening of my arrival. “You will soon,” observed Madge, ".lira’s been put to bed three times this week because of them.” “Sneak!” muttered Jim, spilling half a soap dish of water over the

schoolroom table with one hand, while with the other he drew from the bosom of his sailor shirt a sheet of curious, flimsy-lookiug designs. “See!” he continued, too absorbed to quarrel. “You tear the picture off where the sort of stamp-paper stuff is, and dip them in water like this” (here he floated a dim. glazed design in the soap-dish), "and then ,you draw them along something——” “Generally the library-wall,” interrupted Madge, whose genius for aggravation was only surpassed by the alacrity with which she removed herself from its consequences. She was out on the terrace and had slammed the French window behind her, before Jim could rise to give chase, and by asking permission to “draw out” one or two works or art on a sheet of notepaper I averted the scuffle. On passing through the library next morning T was arrested by a brilliant patch of colour relieving the monotony of its neutral-tinted wall. “This, then, is a ‘transfer,’ ” I remarked, regarding with some interest the counterfeit presentment of a red-and-yellow clown brandishing a string of sausages. “Yes,” said my host grimly. “This room’s only just been done up, and Jim naturally chose it in preference to any other spot in the house to •draw off’—the correct expression, 1 believe —his abominable transfers. There would have been a dado of these things in another moment. But ” He paused, but there was so much satisfaction conveyed in the simple words that I should have been surprised if Jim had chosen the library again. “Yet, it’s tempting wall for a transfer,” was my only remark as we went in to breakfast. I was in no danger of forgetting these works of art during my short visit. They forced themselves upon my notice, indeed, with quite embarrassing frequency. Many a dusky corner of the passages was made brilliant by their presence. They adorned the first pages of many a book. One had but to stoop a little, even in the drawingroom, and under the ledge of the mantel-pieces, pigs in pink petticoats, dogs with idiotic ruffs and spectacles, and many a smiling if highly-coloured landscape met the enraptured gaze. Wherever, in short, a smooth surface presented itself, there was the transfer. Threats and punishments seemed unavailing in the face of an overmastering temptation which beset every member of the family in equal degree. I had left the drawing-room to fetch some needlework one evening after dinner, when upstairs I encountered Phil on his way to the bathroom. Phil was attired in a red flannel dressing-gown belonging to one of the girls, which he held in graceful folds over one arm, disclosing a brief frilled nightgown. “Where’s Jane?” I asked, stooping to kiss him —Phil in his nightdress was irresistible. “Isn’t she going to bath you ?”

“Phil’s going to barf his own self,” he responded with some hauteur. And 1 descended with a sense of having unwarrantably interfered with the private arrangements of a delicateminded gentleman. “Only ten minutes’ play, Master Phil,” called Jane from the room still

known as the nursery. And I understood that Phil’s bathing was as yet conducted by his own self under strict superintendence. It must have been a quarter of an hour later when Mrs. Silverton put down the newspaper with a sudden movement.

“What’s that?” she,inquired sharply. To me all sounds in heaven and earth were merged in the ear-pierc-ing shrieks of Jim’s violin. It was the terrible half-hour after dinner, when the children “got out their music.” and demonstrated to everyone but their mother what fiendish ingenuity could accomplish in the way of noise, assisted by Norah and Madge at the piano and Jim at the violin. “Listen!” she called again. But Norah, who was three bars behind Madge, and Madge, who had at least six to make up before she overtook Jim. felt that time pressed, and it was some moments before they could be induced to stop.

In the dead calm which followed their rendering of “The Blue Bells of Scotland” the voice of Jane was clearly audible, crying in agonised tones: “Open the door. Master Phil—only open the door! Why' has the child locked the door?” “That’s Phil,” exclaimed Mrs. Silverton tragically. “Locked into the bathroom! Oh, who ever allowed ”

She was out of the room before the blame could be satisfactorily attached to anyone, followed in hot pursuit by every member of the household. I arrived on the scene to find Jane in tears, Mrs. Silverton on her knees at the keyhole, and the rest of the family grouped in awestruck attitudes at the head of the stairs.

“Open the door, darling!” implored Mrs. Silverton, in frenzied accents. “Phil e-a-n’t!” was the feeble and frightened wail from within.

“Go and fetch your father!” cried Mrs Silverton, who in moments of emergency, at least, was wont to rely on George.

“Hallo! what’s all this about?” he exclaimed, appearing at the moment. “Can’t undo the door? Why not? it’s only a button.”

A movement of his penknife within the lock and all was done, the family immediately making a wild rush to see and condole with their youngest. “Phil, my darling! what ever is it?” shrieked Mrs Silverton, falling back against the bath-room door, with some vague notion of a sudden and awful visitation of Providence. “Why, it’s them nasty transfers, ma’am!” declared Jane. “And him that faint! Well. I never knew a child like him in all my born days. Never!”

And I was not surprised, for to say the least of it. Phil’s appearance was unusual. Pallid and exhausted, in an atmosphere reeking with steam, he lay back in the bath richly emblazoned. so to speak, with every imaginable kind of picture. Little boys presenting little girls with bouquets, bunches of forget-me-nots. a whole farmyard of animals, foxes with dogs in pursuit, dancing bears, sportive kittens, and performing elephants were disposed in artless confusion about his person, with an effect so astounding as to defy description. After one glance at his ingenious son Mr Silverton retired to the passage. where he remained some moments convulsed with what his wife afterwards described as “heartless laughter.” Within. the bathroom rang with pitying ejaculations and endearments.

“Wrap him up in this blanket. Jane, and carry him into the nursery. Poor child! See how faint he is. Oh. Phil dear. never- never loek the door again!" cried his mother in des|>erate accents.

While Phil, his radiance shrouded in voluminous folds of blankets, was borne away in Jane's arms. When a few moments later I pee|>ed into the nursery. Fraulein, on her knees beside him, nail-brush in hand, wias removing a cheerful ballroom scene from his right shoulder. The process was a slow one. and. as large floral designs extended the length of his arms. I was not surprised to hear her “Aeh neins!” and “Seh nurs!" long after the rest of the children had jrone to lied—all of them. 1 am convinced, consumed with envious admiration of Phil’s superior ingenuity in the matter of transfers. THE END.