CHAPTER XXV.
THE "HOUSEHOLD ALBUM"-- SKETCHING UNDER DIFFICULTIES--A NEW SPECIES ?--JACK'S BARGAIN--THEORIES.
Out of motherly affection, and also because their early attempts at drawing were very clever, Mrs.Arkwright had, years before, begun a scrapbook, or "Household Album," as it was called, into which she pasted such of her children's original drawings as were held good enough for the honour; the age of the artist being taken into account.
Jack's gift in this line was not as great as that of Clement or Eleanor, but this was not the only reason why no drawing of his appeared in the scrapbook.

Mrs.Arkwright demanded more evidence of pains and industry than Jack was wont to bestow on his sketches or designs.

He resented his exclusion, and made many efforts to induce his mother to accept his hasty productions; but it was not till the summer to which I alluded that Jack took his place in the "Household Album." It was during a long drive, in which we were exhibiting the country to some friends, that Eleanor and I chose the place of that particular sketching expedition.

The views it furnished had the first, and almost the only, quality demanded by young and tyro sketchers--they were very pretty.
There was some variety, too, to justify our choice.

From the sandy road, where a heathery bank afforded the convenience of seats, we could look down into a valley with a winding stream, whose banks rose into hillsides which lost themselves in finely-coloured mountains of moorland.
Farther on, a scramble on foot over walls and gates had led us into a wooded gorge fringed with ferns, where a group of trees of particularly graceful form roused Eleanor's admiration.
"What a lovely view!" had burst from the lips of our friends at every quarter of a mile; for they were of that (to me) trying order of carriage companions who talk about the scenery as you go, as a point of politeness.
But the views _were_ beautiful--"Sketches everywhere!" we cried.
"There's nothing to make a sketch _of_ round the Vicarage," we added.
"We've done the church, with the Deadmanstone Hills behind it, and without the Deadmanstone Hills behind it, till we are sick of the subject." So, the weather being fine, and even hot, we provided ourselves with luncheon and sketching materials, and made an expedition to the point we had selected.
We were tired by the time we reached it.