Certainly it was n't . Surely not even the straitest sect of the grown-ups could call it so . If writing down your dreams , with agonizing care as to composition and spelling -- for who knew that the eyes of generations unborn might not read the record ? -- were not a harmless amusement , could anything be called so ? I trow not . We had been at it for a fortnight , and during that time we only lived to have dreams and write them down . The Story Girl had originated the idea one evening in the rustling , rain-wet ways of the spruce wood , where we were picking gum after a day of showers . When we had picked enough , we sat down on the moss-grown stones at the end of a long arcade , where it opened out on the harvest-golden valley below us , our jaws exercising themselves vigorously on the spoil of our climbings . We were never allowed to chew gum in school or in company , but in wood and field , orchard and hayloft , such rules were in abeyance . `` My Aunt Jane used to say it was n't polite to chew gum anywhere , '' said Peter rather ruefully . `` I do n't suppose your Aunt Jane knew all the rules of etiquette , '' said Felicity , designing to crush Peter with a big word , borrowed from the Family Guide . But Peter was not to be so crushed . He had in him a certain toughness of fibre , that would have been proof against a whole dictionary . `` She did , too , '' he retorted . `` My Aunt Jane was a real lady , even if she was only a Craig . She knew all those rules and she kept them when there was nobody round to see her , just the same as when any one was . And she was smart . If father had had half her git-up-and-git I would n't be a hired boy to-day . '' `` Have you any idea where your father is ? '' asked Dan .
`` No , '' XXXXX Peter indifferently .
called knew picked picking read said spruce suppose trow write