Peter Pan in Kensington Gardens | Page 8

would be able to retire on a competency. Peter now gave him a pound.
He cut it off his bank-note with a sharp stick.
This made Solomon his friend for ever, and after the two had consulted
together they called a meeting of the thrushes. You will see presently
why thrushes only were invited.
The scheme to be put before them was really Peter's, but Solomon did
most of the talking, because he soon became irritable if other people
talked. He began by saying that he had been much impressed by the
superior ingenuity shown by the thrushes in nest-building, and this put
them into good-humour at once, as it was meant to do; for all the
quarrels between birds are about the best way of building nests. Other
birds, said Solomon, omitted to line their nests with mud, and as a
result they did not hold water. Here he cocked his head as if he had
used an unanswerable argument; but, unfortunately, a Mrs. Finch had
come to the meeting uninvited, and she squeaked out, "We don't build
nests to hold water, but to hold eggs," and then the thrushes stopped
cheering, and Solomon was so perplexed that he took several sips of
water.
"Consider," he said at last, "how warm the mud makes the nest."
"Consider," cried Mrs. Finch, "that when water gets into the nest it
remains there and your little ones are drowned."
The thrushes begged Solomon with a look to say something crushing in
reply to this, but again he was perplexed.

"Try another drink," suggested Mrs. Finch pertly. Kate was her name,
and all Kates are saucy.
Solomon did try another drink, and it inspired him. "If," said he, "a
finch's nest is placed on the Serpentine it fills and breaks to pieces, but
a thrush's nest is still as dry as the cup of a swan's back."
How the thrushes applauded! Now they knew why they lined their
nests with mud, and when Mrs. Finch called out, "We don't place our
nests on the Serpentine," they did what they should have done at first:
chased her from the meeting. After this it was most orderly. What they
had been brought together to hear, said Solomon, was this: their young
friend, Peter Pan, as they well knew, wanted very much to be able to
cross to the Gardens, and he now proposed, with their help, to build a
boat.
At this the thrushes began to fidget, which made Peter tremble for his
scheme.
Solomon explained hastily that what he meant was not one of the
cumbrous boats that humans use; the proposed boat was to be simply a
thrush's nest large enough to hold Peter.
But still, to Peter's agony, the thrushes were sulky. "We are very busy
people," they grumbled, "and this would be a big job."
"Quite so," said Solomon, "and, of course, Peter would not allow you to
work for nothing. You must remember that he is now in comfortable
circumstances, and he will pay you such wages as you have never been
paid before. Peter Pan authorises me to say that you shall all be paid
sixpence a day."
Then all the thrushes hopped for joy, and that very day was begun the
celebrated Building of the Boat. All their ordinary business fell into
arrears. It was the time of year when they should have been pairing, but
not a thrush's nest was built except this big one, and so Solomon soon
ran short of thrushes with which to supply the demand from the
mainland. The stout, rather greedy children, who look so well in

perambulators but get puffed easily when they walk, were all young
thrushes once, and ladies often ask specially for them. What do you
think Solomon did? He sent over to the housetops for a lot of sparrows
and ordered them to lay their eggs in old thrushes' nests and sent their
young to the ladies and swore they were all thrushes! It was known
afterward on the island as the Sparrows' Year, and so, when you meet,
as you doubtless sometimes do, grown-up people who puff and blow as
if they thought themselves bigger than they are, very likely they belong
to that year. You ask them.
Peter was a just master, and paid his work-people every evening. They
stood in rows on the branches, waiting politely while he cut the paper
sixpences out of his bank-note, and presently he called the roll, and
then each bird, as the names were mentioned, flew down and got
sixpence. It must have been a fine sight.
And at last, after months of labor, the boat was finished. Oh, the
deportment of Peter as he saw it growing more and more like a great
thrush's nest! From the very beginning