This Cherry Ripe was old and ugly. He never seemed to shave, and yet his beard never seemed to grow. What there was looked a mangy grey streaked with brown. He wore an old hat that had once been black, but was now rather inclined to turn green, and he had glittering eyes, one of which watered. He had also a curious way of lifting up and down his eyebrows, which young Smythe said showed a bad disposition, and was common to gorillas. He had been heard to laugh when picking apples with his daughters. But he never laughed at us, and when we took to calling him ’Cherry Ripe,’ he hated us, and often shook his fist at us from a distance.
So we then felt something had to be done against him to score off him.
When this was decided upon, Steggles and Methuen and Pedlar and myself—me being Weston minor—and Chilvers went into committee, as it is called, and in fact we had a regular meeting. Many others wanted to join, but we felt five was enough, and we all had a jolly special private good reason for going into committee against Cherry Ripe.
Chilvers of course had been licked by Cherry Ripe, because to box one’s ears is the same as licking one in a very insulting manner. Pedlar also had been insulted, and a good deal hurried twice by Cherry Ripe, when he found him catapulting quite harmlessly in his orchard in December, when of course there was nothing to take but vegetables; and Methuen and Steggles once meeting Cherry Ripe going the rounds with his cart and fruit and scales for weighing things, had politely stopped him and asked to buy two pennyworth of pears. And Cherry Ripe had the frightful impertinence to say that "No chap wearing them hats" should have so much as a spring onion of his growing, which was not only turning away business, but cheeking the school colours openly. So it seemed about time to do something, and we accordingly did. I may say that I had no particular grudge against Cherry Ripe, but I was well known at being better at wall-climbing than any chap who ever came to Merivale. Climbing had always been my strong point, and, as I was also going to be a missionary later in life, I kept it up, because you never know—not if you are a missionary.
The committee merely decided that as the cherry season was now near, we had better wait for it, and then, at the first opportunity, make a ’Jameson raid.’ This is a particular sort of raid invented by the great Dr. Jameson of South Africa, and it consists of doing something so suddenly that nobody is ready. A Jameson raid is useless if the other side is prepared; it is also useless if you are not prepared yourself. The great thing is to be first, and also an important point is to commit the raid where and when it will be least expected. Therefore we gave it out, hoping that it would somehow get to Cherry Ripe, that we meant to make a raid on his young apples on Wednesday, being a half-holiday; whereas the truth was we were going to have a dash at his cherries on the Saturday. There was a cricket match on that day, and Steggles arranged details.