Page:Ragged Trousered Philanthropists.djvu/264

The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists once been a good suit of clothes. They had been purchased at a second-hand shop last summer, and had been his 'best' for several months, but they were now much too small for him.

Little Rosie, who was only just over three years old, was better off than either of the other two, for she had a red cloth dress that fitted her perfectly; indeed, as the district visitor who gave it to her mother had remarked, it looked as if it had been made for her.

'It's not much to look at,' observed Nellie, referring to her big jacket, 'but all the same we was very glad of it when the rain came on.'

The coat was so big that by withdrawing her arms from the sleeves and using it as a cloak or shawl she had managed to make it cover all three of them.

Tommy's boots were so broken that the wet had got in and saturated his stockings, so Nora made him take them off and wear some old ones of Frankie's whilst his own were drying at the fire.

Philpot arrived with two large paper bags full of oranges and nuts, and after tea he started a fine game, pretending to be a dreadful wild animal which he called a 'Pandroculus.' He wore a funny mask out of one of the crackers, and, crawling about on all fours, rolled his goggle eyes and growled out that he must have a little boy or girl for his supper. He looked so terrible that although they knew it was only a joke they were almost afraid of him and ran away laughing and screaming to shelter themselves behind Nora or Owen. But all the same, whenever Philpot left off playing, they entreated him to 'be it again,' and so he had to keep on being a 'Pandroculus' until exhaustion compelled him to return to his natural form.

After this they all sat round the table and had a game of cards. 'Snap' they called it, but nobody paid much attention to the rules: the principal idea seemed to be to make as much noise as possible. After a while Philpot suggested a change to 'Beggar my neighbour,' and won quite a lot of cards before they found out that he had hidden all the jacks in the pocket of his coat, and mobbed him for a cheat. He might have been seriously injured if it had not been for Bert, who created a diversion by standing on a chair and announcing that he was about to introduce to their notice 'Bert White's World Famed Pandoramer as exhibited before all the nobility and 252