Lesson Twenty-six The best art critics
I am an art student and I paint a lot of pictures. Many people pretend that
They understand modern art. They always tell you what a picture is ‘about’.
Of course, many pictures are not ‘about’ anything. They are just pretty patterns.
We like them in the same way that we like pretty curtain material.
I think that young children often appreciate modern pictures better than anyone
Else. They notice more. My sister is only seven, but she always tells me
Whether my pictures are good or not. She came into my room yesterday.
‘What are you doing?’ she asked.
‘I am hanging this picture on the wall,’ I answered. ‘it’s a new one. Do you like it?’
She looked at it critically for a moment. ‘it’s all right,’ she said,
‘but isn’t it upside down?’ I looked at it again. She was right! It was!
Lesson Twenty-seven A wet night
Late in the afternoon, the boys put up their tent in the middle of a field.
As soon as this was done, they cooked a meal over an open fire.
They were all hungry and the food smelled good. After a wonderful meal,
They told stories and sang songs by the campfire. But some time later it
Began to rain. The boys felt tired so they put out the fire and crept into their tent.
Their sleeping bags were warm and comfortable, so they all slept soundly.
The tent was full of water! They all leapt out of their sleeping bags and hurried
Outside. It was raining heavily and they found that a stream had formed in the field.
The stream wound its way across the field and then flowed right under their tent.
Lesson Twenty-eight No parking
Jasper White is one of those rare people who believes in ancient myths.
He has just bought a new house in the city, but ever since he moved in,
he has had trouble with cars and their owners. When he returns home at night,
he always finds that someone has parked a car outside his gate. Because of this,
he has not been able to get his own car into his garage even once.
Jasper has put up ‘No Parking’ signs outside his gate, but these have not
Had any effect. Now he has put an ugly stone head over the gate.
It is one of the ugliest faces I have ever seen. I asked him what it was and
He told me that is was Medusa, The Gorgon. Jasper hopes that she will
Turn cars and their owners to stone. But none of them has been turn to stone yet!
Lesson Twenty-nine Taxi!
Captain Ben Fawcett has bought an unusual taxi and has begun a new service.
The ‘taxi’ is a small Swiss aeroplane called a ‘Pilatus Porter’. This wonderful plane
Can carry seven passengers. The most surprising thing about it, however,
Is that it can land anywhere: on snow, water, or even on a ploughed field.
Captain Fawcett’s first passenger was a doctor who flew from Birmingham to
A lonely village in the Welsh mountains. Since then, Captain Fawcett has flown
Passengers to many unusual places. Once he landed on the roof of a block of flats
And on another occasion, he landed in a deserted car park. Captain Fawcett
Has just refused a strange request from a businessman. The man wanted to fly
To Rockall, a lonely island in the Atlantic Ocean, but Captain Fawcett did not take him
Because the trip was too dangerous.
Lesson Thirty Football or polo?
The Wayle is a small river that cuts across the park near my home.
I like sitting by the Wayle on fine afternoons. It was warm last Sunday,
So I went and sat on the river bank as usual. Some children were playing
Games on the bank and there were some people rowing on the river.
Suddenly, one of the children kicked a ball very hard and it went towards
A passing boat. Some people on the bank called out to the man in the boat,
But he did not hear them. The ball stuck him so hard that he nearly fell into
The water. I turned to look at the children, but there weren’t any in sight:
They had all run away! The man laughed when he realizedWhat had happened.
He called out to the children and threw the ball back to bank.
