Those superior Londoners who know nothing at first hand about Nature “unimproved,” the type who find complete satisfaction for soul, body and mind at some loud and crowded seaside resort, sometimes say to me: “I can’t think how you can endure the terrible isolation of the country—with absolutely nothing to look at, no one to say a word, nobody to take the slightest interest in you, dead or alive. Well, I should go out of my mind in such solitariness! But then, I am so human; I do like a little life,” etc.

I don’t attempt to convert such people. After all, they are just as much entitled to their views as I am to mine. Besides, I am only too thankful that they keep away from our hills, and disport themselves in an environment more in keeping with their personal tastes. We don’t want the blatant woman, or the overdressed (which nowadays means underdressed) woman, or the artificial woman, or the woman who “likes a little life”; our hills would never suit them as a background, either mentally or otherwise. Why, we have neither a music-hall nor a picture palace for I don’t know how many miles round! A benighted spot, isn’t it!

But when they reproach us with having no one to say a word, and nobody to take the slightest interest in our doings—well, I could say many things! But I merely assure them that we are nothing if not neighbourly!

I took my sewing and went down to the bottom of the lower orchard. It was a warm day, but not too hot to sit out of doors at eleven in the morning, provided one found a shelter from the sun overhead. As I have explained before, my cottage is on a steep hillside, the whole earth runs either up or down. In only a few favoured spots can you place a chair—and sit on it—with any degree of certainty; and even then you probably have to level up the back, or the front, by putting some flat stones under two of the legs. The slope of the hill faces south; hence we get all the sun there is.

The bottom of the lower orchard was just the place for such a day. A wall with overhanging tangles of honeysuckle and ivy, and an oak-tree that spread big arms well over the wall, gave just the shade one needed from the blazing sun. I put the wicker chair with its back to the wall—and such a comfort a wall is anywhere out of doors when you want to sit down.

The view from this spot is very restful on a summer’s day: the hot south is behind; one faces the cooler, glareless northern sky above the hill that rises before one.

This orchard is but sparsely populated with fruit-trees, and most of these are very old. There are some huge pear-trees that rise tall and fairly straight, suggestive of rather well-fed poplars. There are some twisted, rugged apple-trees, every branch and twig presenting a wonderful study in silver and grey and green filigree, where the lichens have spread and revelled unmolested for many a year. The lichens are so marvellously beautiful, it always takes me quite a time to get down to the lower wall; there is so much to look at on the way. The delicate fronds, that seem closely related in their appearance to the hoarfrost designs on the winter windows, show such a variety of different cluster-schemes. They decorate the odd corners, and throw beauty over the hard knots and gnarls, till I sometimes think they are among the most exquisite things Nature has ever produced—only while I am thinking this, I come upon something else equally beautiful.

Even on a hot day, when most of the mosses and lichens have faded in the glare and drought, we still find the silvery-grey tracery flourishing on the shady side of the apple-trees, and on the pieces of branches that were snapped off and blown down into the long grass by the equinoctial gales. I usually gather up an armful of these branches, with their delicate pencil studies on a darker background, and carry them down to the bottom of the orchard with me—only to wonder why I didn’t leave them where they were till I returned, as I have to carry them back up the hill again presently!

It may seem weakly sentimental to those who do not understand, but I confess that, much as I love the smell of burning applewood, it always gives me a real pain to put on the fire twigs that are ornamented with moss or lichen. It seems heartless to destroy such beauty, even though there is “plenty more where that came from,” as people sometimes tell me.

In the summer I put the pieces of the grey-green branches, that I gather up about the orchard, in the empty hearths and grates.

Many of the old trees originally planted in the lower orchard have died or been blown down; the wind takes a heavy toll from these heights; we can’t have pergolas and rose arches up here, as they can lower down in the valley, unless we fasten them to very firm foundations.

As no previous owner in this happy-go-lucky district thought it worth whiles to put new stock in the place of the fruit-trees that have come down, there are plenty of open spaces, and comparatively little to obstruct the view as you sit against the bottom wall and look up the hillside. I am afraid this orchard is more ornamental than useful, for the pears are the hard bitter sort used for making perry, a drink that is very popular locally; and the apples are the equally uninteresting-to-the-taste cider variety. Yet they are so exceptionally beautiful, as the fruit turns crimson and yellow and golden brown, that the trees become a glory of colour in fruit-gathering time.

After all there is excuse for ornament without specific use, if a thing be very, very ornamental—and the orchard certainly is that.

The sun reaches well under the trees, where the wild flowers and grasses make a softly waving sea of colour. Of course, I know the grass ought to be kept cut, so as to prevent undue nourishment being taken from the earth for the support of “mere weeds.” But we pretend that it is properly cropped by “Hussy;” she is the mild-eyed dusky Jersey, belonging to the farmeress who supplies our milk, and is so-called, because she has a playful habit of kicking over the pail.

Occasionally she is turned in and roams about at meditative leisure, to the indignation of the small dog, who regards her as a hated rival. But once the fruit appears, she has to be removed; either she chokes herself with pears, or else they don’t agree with the butter; or various other things. Even a cow seems a complicated problem when you own a real one; and though I have only had cow-anxieties secondhand, so to speak, my acquaintance with “Hussy” has led me to wonder whether, on the whole, a tin of milk is a more sure and certain investment for sixpence-halfpenny.

But even when the orchard has a tenant, it is surprising how little damage she seems to do to the wild flowers. This is all the more remarkable if you have ever seen what devastation one simple-minded cow is capable of, if it indulges in but a ten minutes’ revel in your flower-garden! “Hussy” seems to eat carefully round the flowers, leaving the whole plant intact, which is more than a mowing machine will do, despite its much vaunted up-to-dateness. Civilisation has still a lot to learn.

Every season has its special flower show in this orchard. I only wish I could get the same never-failing succession of flowers in my garden that Nature does in hers.

On this particular July day the large field scabious was perhaps the most noticeable flower; its mauve-blue blossoms high above all the rest; its long stalks always determining to out-top everything else that grows in the delightful medley.

“Please, ma’am, I’ve brought you some flowers,” said a little pinafored girl to me one day, when I had just arrived. She is an especial favourite of mine, and lives in a cottage along my lane. This is her way of just being neighbourly. In her hand was a large bunch of scabious and grasses.

“These are very pretty,” I said. “What do you call them?”

“Please, ma’am, I call them ‘Queen Mary’s Pincushions,’” she said shyly.

The country names for the flowers are often so much more interesting than the ones you find attached to them in books. After all, “Queen Mary’s Pincushion” has something real and understandable about it for just ordinary people like myself; whereas Scabiosa arvensis (its proper name) doesn’t stir my heart the least little bit. It was easy to see the process by which the child had got the name—the flowers are wonderfully like plump round pincushions, with the stamens for the pins: but anything so delicately beautiful would not be suitable for aught save a royal lady’s dressing-table; hence Queen Mary was, of course, the one to whom they were dedicated.

And isn’t the name “Lady’s Laces” most suggestive? That is what we call the white filmy flowers of the hedge-parsley. I seldom see a fine white lace evening gown without thinking of the soft mist of white over green that surprises us in June, and smothers the orchard when the Lady’s Laces suddenly burst into billows of bloom.

Some of the local names are more material and prosaic than idealistic, however. There is another flower that grows all about the orchard, in close company with the scabious; it has bunches of bright yellow flowers of the daisy family, growing in compact heads at the top of a tall stem. I am very fond of this flower; it gleams sunshine all over the place; but I don’t care to call it Senecio Jacoboea, which is its proper name; it’s so mortifying when people look at you puzzled and inquiring, and then ask, with a patient sigh, if you would mind spelling it! I never could spell.

Neither do I care for its other slightly less official name, “Common Ragwort.” So one day when an old man was passing, who is fairly well-up in flowers, I asked him if he could tell me the name of this Sunshine plant. To which he replied—

“Wealluscallsemards’m.”

I didn’t ask him to spell it, because I don’t fancy he can spell any better than I can. I merely said, “I don’t think I quite caught the name?”

“I said ‘’ARDS,’ Mum; (crescendo) ‘’ARDS.’ We allus calls ’em that ’cos they’re so ’ard to pull up.”

I thanked him, and still, in secret, call them the Sunshine flowers—though I admit that Virginia, having recently set out gaily to rectify my shocking laxity in the matter of the proper cultivation of an orchard, at last decided herself to call them “’Ards.” She found that the act of sitting down violently and unexpectedly so many times in the course of trying to pull up a few innocent-looking plants, wore her out more than it did the ’ards; so she gave it up at length, and there they remain until this day!

Intermingling with Queen Mary’s Pincushions and the Sunshine flowers is a rosy purple flower that blends delightfully with the other two; Knapweed is one of its names; it looks something like a thistle bloom at a distance, but it is really a relation of the Sweet Sultan that grows in the garden beds, I believe.

Then there are Harebells dancing in the wind on the top of little grassy mounds; so frail they look—yet “Hussy” never seems to walk on them! Ragged Robins flutter pink petals beside a little brook that runs down at the side of the orchard; and here are also big blue forget-me-nots, with bright yellow centres.

But there is one thing about this orchard that very few people have discovered, and that is the host of sweet-smelling things that you walk on or rub against, as you carry the wicker-chair down to the bottom wall.

Do you know what it is like to walk on Pennyroyal and Sweet Basil? Have you ever stood still suddenly and said, “What is it?” as a delicious aromatic scent added itself to all the other lovely scents floating around?

I discovered a whole world of beautiful scents in among the orchard grass. The Pennyroyal was most unsuspicious-looking, till I stepped on it. (I didn’t mean to step on it; but then one must walk somewhere!) Next I found out the Sweet Basil, with its unobtrusive pink flowers.

Still I hadn’t found it all; a little later I came upon some wild mint beside the brook. The tansy I had long been friendly with; the scent of it seems to fit in so exactly with a hot summer day; and the wild thyme that grows on a sunny bank at one side of the orchard you couldn’t possibly miss, the bees have so much to say about it. Bushes of balm, that have possibly strayed away from the garden, are always at hand, to rub a leaf when desired.

But I think of all my favourites, the black peppermint has first place. I shall never forget the day I first discovered its dark shoots pushing up undaunted among the grass; not but what I had a long-standing friendship with peppermint—in my first childhood, as bull’s-eyes; in my second childhood, as peppermint creams.

But I hadn’t the slightest notion what it was like in its natural state. When once I found it, I soon realised that it stood alone among all the scented wonders. I put some of it at various corners about the garden, because I found it has remarkable healing powers. No matter how dispirited you may be or out of joint with the world, it is only necessary to take a leaf, rub it and sniff it, whereupon the world smiles again, and you realise that, in spite of all, it is good to be alive. You will understand, therefore, how essential it is to have it in handy places, so that weary people, even if they do not know of its unique qualities, may rub against it in passing, and unconsciously come under its spell.

It dies down in the winter, but when spring comes we always look eagerly for the first purple-black shoots pushing up cheerily from the soil.

It has only one fault; it suffers from zeal without discretion. It will not keep within proper bounds. At the present moment I am wondering whether it is better to dig up the bergamot or rout out the peppermint; they are having a hand-to-hand fight for supremacy in one particular flower corner.

I am afraid my needlework was a mere matter of form that morning. Who could glue their eyes to a piece of hemstitching with the whole earth fairly dancing with colour and light around them? I faintly (but not very earnestly) wished that I had brought knitting instead of sewing, because that doesn’t need to be looked at, and you can keep up a semblance of respectable industry while you are watching all the wild things.

I had been feeling rather aggravated with a woman who had written commiserating with my odd predilection for being “buried” in a spot where there was “positively nothing to be seen.” She was really pitying me! Well, I pitied her back, and pitied her hard; had she only known it, she would have been aggravated too. So at least we were quits. She had said that, for her part, she should simply die in such an unsociable place. I took care to be just as sorry for her as she was for me: it was a slight satisfaction to me! It was at this moment that I heard voices of two women talking in the lane, hidden from view by the orchard wall.

“How’s yourself, Mrs. Blake?”

“Only middling.” (We always start our conversations with lugubriousness; it seems indecorous to parade health and happiness before our neighbours!) “I’m in a tearing hurry. I’ve just been to the doctor’s to see if he can’t give me something for my poor Jim’s tooth. It do pester him something cruel. I promised him I’d run all the way there and back; he’ll be raving till I get back.”

“Ah, he won’t get no peace till he has it out, I reckon.”

“The doctor says why don’t he have ’em out and get some new ’uns? But I call it waste. Look at my sister’s husband: cost him a guinea his did! Of course, he got a complete set top and bottom for that, fifty-three teeth altogether I believe he told me, and as natural as you please, I’ll own. But seeing as of course he’s got to take ’em out to eat, I call it spending just for show, even if they do give you a good mouthful for your money.”

“By the way, speaking of teeth reminds me—only I can’t stop to tell you all about it now, as the children’ll be in from school at half-past twelve, and I haven’t started the dinner yet—but I’ve just heard that poor Mrs. Jeggins over to Brownbrook’s gone.”

“Pore thing! Is she though?”

“Yes, your mentioning Jim’s tooth made me think of it. They fancy it started with a tooth in her case too; for she had faceache turrible bad about six months ago, her husband told me. And then it just went all over her like. The doctor simply couldn’t do nothing with it. He tried every mortal bottle he had in his surgery, and gave her some out of every single one, and yet she died! But there, I s’pose it had to be!”

“I heeard tell from her sist’r-’n-law as she drank somethin’ awful; but, mind you, if it’s a lie, ’taint my lie; it’s her lie as told me. And I don’t at all hold with repeating a thing like that. But in any case, I shouldn’t think it was her tooth! I expect she et something that didn’t agree with her.”

“Well, maybe; as I always say, you can’t be too careful what you eat nowadays. The dinner they’ve got up there smells tasty, don’t it?”

“Yes; it’s roast duck.”

“Duck, is it? I didn’t know they’d had a duck this week. Who did they get it from?”

“Sarah Ann Perkins—that old brown one of hers.”

“The brown one! How much did she ask for it?”

“Four-and-six.” (An audible chuckle.) “Yes, four-and-six, if you believe me! Fancy her having the face to ask it for that brown duck! But there, those that can afford to pay may just as well do so for those who can’t.”

“Just as well. But—four-and-six! And she won’t finish it up neither; doesn’t care for cold poultry, I’m told; she’ll have a fair slice from the breast, but that’s all; never allows it to be seen in the dining-room a second time. And there’s only the two of them there now. Still, that Abigail’s a hearty eater! My husband was up there a-fixing a tile that had got loosish on the roof, and he told me what she et that day. A gammon rasher and an egg and four slices of bread and butter and a piece of fried bread out of the frying-pan and two cups of coffee—half milk—and some jam for breakfast. He was just a-going up the ladder past the kitchen window at the time; and when he come down, finding as he needed a bit of cement, she was having lunch of bread and cheese and a cup o’ tea out of her lady’s teapot—she always has a cup of tea between ’leven and twelve—and he’d smoked his pipe right out afore she’d finished. And when he come down again at dinner-time she was having a dinner fit for a growed man just come home from the cattle market—made him hungry to see her, it did; he hung about a bit looking for his jack-knife, as he wanted something to measure with. And at tea-time he went in for a drop o’ water to mix the cement, and she was having potted meat and toast—butter, too, not dripping toast, if you ever did. But, of course, she relishes the good vittles she gets in a country place like ourn. So different to the stuff you get in a town.”

“You’re right there; but they do have a sight o’ things down from London. There was a box with ‘Army and Navy Stores’ writ on it that was so heavy, it was all old Bob could do to get it on his shoulder, with our Tom to give him a hand. Old Bob said he’d been reading in the papers what awful waste there is in some o’ the army camps and how the food gets throw’d away or sold by the cartload, to get rid of it, but he didn’t know it was going on in the navy too—wicked, I call it. They thought it must be tinned things, it were such a weight, but they couldn’t make out for sure, though they rattled it ever so hard to see; it was packed up awful tight.”

“Taters weigh heavy, but it wouldn’t be they; she’s got plenty, what with new ones coming on soon, and a large box left still of the old ones; I saw them in the scullery last time I was there. I’m going to ask if I can have ’em, I’m so short for the pig. It might have been soap and soda and hearthstone, though; they all weighs heavy.”

“That’s true. Still, I know for certain she has a heap of queer things sent down, because when I was in Jane Price’s the other day, she had a pot of something called ‘tunny fish,’ whatever that may be, on the dresser. I asked her what it was. She told me she was passing here one day and thought she heard someone calling her name; so she stepped inside and looked around. No one was there, but she chanced to pass the back door, and there on the top of the dustbin she saw this pot. She brought it away with her just to ask our Tom if he knew what it was; but he says they don’t catch it about here; never heeard tell on it. Still, those sort of things aren’t like a nice piece of fat bacon to my taste, to say nothing of duck; though I like a bit more picking on mine than they’ll be on that brown one, I reckon.”

“D’you know, I expect they’re cooking it now to have it cold for the company’s supper to-night, because in any case they don’t need it to-day. They had two chops and a shoulder of lamb and some gravy beef on Saturday. I met the boy taking it up, and asked him what he had. They’d have the chops that day, and the lamb roast on Sunday, and cold Monday; and it’s only Tuesday now, and they can’t have finished it up—it was a fair-sized one; and there’s the gravy beef soup. You may depend it’s for the visitors.”

“Oh! I didn’t know she was expecting company? It won’t be Miss Virginia and her sister, because they’re abroad. She asked my husband to call for her afternoon letters as he was passing the post-office yesterday, and he brought ’em up, and there was a postcard with a picture on it of some foreign place, and it said, ‘This is our hotel; enjoying ourselves immensely; expect to be here a fortnight.’ And there was something written at the bottom that I couldn’t make out, but it might have been a ‘V,’ or a ‘U,’ only it was smudged so’s you couldn’t see what it was. So it was sure to be from them.”

“No, it wasn’t they two; ’twasn’t their trunks.”

“More than one trunk, is there? Then they’re going to stay a little while. My Buff Orpingtons have started to lay again; that’s lucky. How many do you say were coming?”

“I don’t know for certain, but I fancy it must be three, because there were two blankets, one single-bed and one double, hanging in the sun when I came past yesterday, and Abigail was polishing the downstairs winders, and she’d got clean cutt’ns to the little room over the kitchen, as well as in the sittin’-room. Not that there was any need to put up clean cutt’ns, that I can see; those in the sittin’-room had only been up two months, and the upstairs ones were new last time she was down here; you could tell they were new, the muslin hung so stiff. I take it a cutt’n isn’t properly washed if it don’t last six months at least. But she’s very pertickler about cutt’ns. Abigail told my Mabel, that in London they don’t never dream of keeping a cutt’n up more than a month, and often th’whole lot is changed in a fortnight; and just think, the winders is done every week! Send me crazy, it would! I don’t think it’s healthy to be as finnicky clean as that; why, you’re always opening winders and letting in draughts. And now this morning I see she’s got the cutt’ns down in the Flower room——”

“The Flower room? Which be that?”

“Oh, it’s the name they’ve give the one on the right at the top o’ the stairs. It’s got a new laylock paper on the wall, and she’s got a new bedspread, white, with bunches of laylock all about it, and a bit o’ eeliertrope sateen hangs down behind the head of the bed to keep the draught off, though it ’ud be far more sense to shut the winder, I say, for that sateen’s faded dretful in the folds already. I was only noticing it th’other day, when my cousin was up from Woolv’ampton, and I took her over the house.... Oh, yes, Mrs. Widow’ll lend me the key any time” (Mrs. Widow is my caretaker), “and it do make a bit of a change to take anyone to. My cousin said at the time she’d never buy a bedspread like that; the colour’s so fleeting. Besides, she wouldn’t have a white ground in any case, it’s always in the wash. She’s made herself a lovely spread, she was telling me, out of a pair of old long curtains, just cutting out the bad places and then dyeing it a deep coffee colour with a little cold tea; makes it last like anything. I say the same; them white spreads never pay for themselves. Though I rather like the one she’s got with roses on—Hannah Craddock was a-washing of it one day when I dropped in” (Hannah is the village laundress), “that was the last time Miss Ursula was down, because Hannah was doing of her blouses that week, and my Mabel was very taken with one that had bits of crochet let in all about, and points of it up the sleeves just here, and my Mabel tried to copy it, only Hannah had promised it home that very afternoon, so we’re waiting for it to come again, as Mabel can’t get the yoke quite right. I’m sorry it isn’t them who’s coming. She wants to get it finished afore she goes to London next month.”

“Did you see the name on the trunks? Now you mention it, I saw the boy taking a telegraft up to the house yesterday—no, the day before.”

“It was my husband told me about it, when he looked in home just now, and his sight being so poor, he couldn’t see the name” (in spite of the Educational Authorities many of the men in our village cannot read, but by courtesy it is always referred to as poor sight!), “so he asked the station-master if he should drop ’em anywhere, as he had got her ladyship’s cart there. He is helping at the Manor House to-day. He’d just taken some hay to the station, and it seemed a real waste o’ good time to do nothing with it coming back. But the station-master said they was for up here, and old Bob was taking ’em up as the ladies wouldn’t have the fly; said they’d pefer to walk. And, would you believe it, he never so much as thought to ask how many there were. Still, I’ll soon find out and let you know. I’ll go up and ask Abigail if she can oblige me with the loan of a little salt. I’ve a couple of ducks myself as I’d be glad to get four-and-six apiece for if——”

At this moment Abigail appeared at the cottage door, and the gong reverberated and echoed as she gave it a vigorous hammering, calculated to wake me up wherever I might be.

“Good gracious, that’s for her one o’clock dinner!” exclaimed both the women in one breath, and fled in opposite directions, presumably to minister to the raving and the ravenous!

As the conversation had implied, the duck was tough and inadequate; but it was a certain satisfaction to me—as I sought about in vain for a fairly good slice from the breast of the skinny carcase—to reflect that I hadn’t paid for it as yet. I was out when the youthful Perkins had delivered it.

For the rest, I didn’t attach any value to the women’s gossip. Once you have any real footing in a rural district, and have become part and parcel of the country-side, you soon learn that one impossibility is “terrible isolation.” From rosy morn till dewy eve one or another woman is engaged in lengthy gossip with any other she meets, and in nearly every case the topic of exhaustive conversation will be the doings of somebody else; moreover, the less that is actually known about the third and absent party the more two and two will add up to nineteen.

In the main, I have seldom found such gossips either spiteful or slanderous. They consider it being neighbourly to keep count of your sayings and doings.

There were two items in the women’s chatter that were enlightening, however. I had always suspected that Mrs. Price knew where certain items from my store cupboard had gone one winter’s night when the cottage was uninhabited and the kitchen window forced. I doubt if there was another person in the place who would have done it. Still I was glad to have the mystery cleared up.

I was not surprised to hear that all and sundry had the run of my house when I wasn’t there. The Englishwoman who occupies any house of more than six rooms, we will say (which she can keep clean her unaided self), knows that she never can call any room her own, excepting the one she chances to be in at the moment—and not even that one if the British workman happens to be in the ascendant! It is one of the compensations of life that the smaller our habitation, the more we ourselves get out of it personally—a kind of “intensive” interest. Whereas the larger our domains, the more imposing our houses, the more numerous our rooms, the more they are monopolised by other people—paid assistants for the most part—to the exclusion of ourselves.

In my own very humble way I soon realised that even my country cottage and its contents were only my own so long as I could sit on them, so to speak. I early discovered that my sheets and pillow-cases, my towels and tablecloths, were not allowed to lead a life of idle, selfish exclusiveness in my absences. Mrs. Widow’s enterprising married daughter quickly furnished a room at her own cottage over an outhouse which had hitherto been used as a lumber garret; this she could always let in the summer, when the big houses in the neighbourhood were full up with visitors and extra rooms were needed.

Of course, at times I proved exceedingly tiresome, and turned up at inconvenient moments. But in such an emergency neighbours would assist her with the loan of a sheet here and there and a towel or two, if mine had to be returned hastily. I have always found the poor most ready to help each other—especially when it was a case of “doing” someone who was a little better off.

No, I was not surprised that Mrs. Widow graciously bestowed my door-key on her friends in search of an afternoon’s recreation; but I was just a trifle curious to know how they had got hold of the lilac bedspread, seeing that it was put away in a cupboard that possessed—so I prided myself—a unique lock; and it had never been used yet—at least, not by me!

After dinner I wrestled womanfully with the overpowering desire to go down the orchard again and do nothing; but a shower seemed threatening, and I decided to answer letters and correct proofs indoors. I told myself I would put in a full afternoon at really solid work, and would even carry it right on into the night, if need be, without a moment’s cessation save for the conventional nourishment—this, in order to clear up some of my arrears, and to enable me to garden the whole of next day with a perky conscience.

“How do you kill time on a wet day in the country?” people sometimes ask me. It’s simple enough. Here is the recipe:

* Draw up a chair to the table; get out ink and pens from one of the aged oak cupboards beside the fireplace. Open the dresser drawers and haul out stacks of unanswered queries from magazine readers, the office staff, printers, block-makers, artists, authors, and from people of whom I know nothing (friends and relatives gave me up long ago!).

Next, take the heavy lid right off the oak chest (hinges were broken fifty years ago, so it won’t lift up properly), dive in for armfuls of MSS., proofs, photographs, diagrams, sketches; place same on table; proceed to hunt among same for some one particular thing I feel I ought to deal with at that particular moment (though it may have lain unhonoured and unsung for weeks); can’t find it anywhere. Go through everything again, this time classifying matter slightly by putting it in piles around me on the floor; still can’t find it, but unearth much else that ought to have been attended to long ago but wasn’t.

Decide to search upstairs; turn out trunks, turn out cupboards, turn out drawers (incidentally discover and meditate upon various things needing mending); forget what I was looking for; go on searching for it; remember presently, and eventually run it to earth in my blotting-book downstairs, where, if I had had any sense, I should have looked in the first instance. Breathe freely, sit down—rather exhausted—to serious work.

A tap at the door; “May I come in?” Enter visitor No. 1. And then they follow in quick succession.

Finally, Abigail kindly undertakes to tidy up my papers “without disturbing a single thing!”*

Next day (if still wet) you repeat from * to *, as they tell us in the crochet patterns.

I had just got settled to work on the missing-and-now-discovered letter, when Abigail tapped and entered.

“I’m sorry to trouble you, ma’am, but could you spare me one of those Missionary books?” pointing to a shelf containing a selection of the annual reports of religious and philanthropic societies.

Now for some time past I had been trying to interest Abigail—who is a church member—in foreign missions. I rather prided myself that I had done it tactfully, not forcing it upon her, but just arousing her interest by taking her to attractive meetings. I found that she had even gone to one on her own account. Hence I was naturally pleased to find that she was anxious to follow up the subject; but as I did not consider an ordinary official report, with its small print, and balance-sheets and monotonous lists of subscribers, the type of literature best calculated to enthuse the novice, I reached down a small volume of bright stories of girl-life in India, well illustrated and prettily got-up.

“Here is just the very thing,” I said. But she took it reluctantly, dubiously, turning it about and looking it over in a dissatisfied manner.

“No,” she said, “it’s one like that I want,” pointing to a solid tome issued by one of the most revered of our missionary societies. “Can I have that one?”

“Certainly,” I acquiesced, though it was an out-of-date report, and I knew the other book would have suited her better.

“Yes, that’s just right,” she said cheerfully, as I handed it to her. “That other’d be too thin; it’s to go under the back leg of the side table in the kitchen, where the stone floor’s broken. I’ve used one like this regular since last summer, but it’s getting shabby. I thought a new one would smarten us up a bit.”

I remember on one occasion being at a missionary meeting for young people, at which there was a remarkably fine speaker from the foreign mission field. He said that if any felt they had a call to take part in the work in any way, he would be pleased to see them at the close. When the meeting was over, a small boy approached the platform. “Please can I speak to you, sir?”

“Certainly, my lad,” said the speaker, shaking him warmly by the hand. “Now, what is it? You can talk quite frankly to me.”

“Well, I wondered if—er——”

“Have no hesitation, my boy, in asking me anything you like.”

“Well, do you happen to have any foreign postage stamps?”

Just as I had settled down again, somewhat chastened, to my much neglected work, there was a knock at the door, and the lady of the manor was shown in.

“I see you’re busy,” she began; “but I won’t keep you a moment. I only want to ask you if you’re expecting Miss Virginia and her sister this afternoon? No? Oh, I am sorry! I did hope they were coming. But, anyhow, whoever it is, do you think they would help to-morrow at the Sale of Work? Two visitors I was expecting have failed me, and I’ve no one possible for the picture post-cards or the pinafores. They needn’t know anything about it, you know; it only wants someone who can reckon up that seven penny cards comes to sevenpence, and that’s one and ninepence change out of half-a-crown, and that sort of thing. Now, do you think your friends would help?”

“But I’ve no friends coming,” I said.

“Haven’t you? Why, I quite understood—— I was calling on Miss Primkins just now (she’s jam and jelly, you know), and I asked her if she couldn’t put it on the pinafores—it would look quite decorative, and in this way I should save a stall; even then we shall be very crowded. Mrs. Blake had just been in to say she couldn’t spare Miss Primkins the duck she had ordered, because you had visitors arriving to-day and would want a pair for Sunday.”

“Oh!! Well, I’m not having visitors, neither am I having the ducks. But I’ll come down myself to-morrow, if that’s any help, and keep one eye on the pinafores and one on the picture postcards. And I think my mental arithmetic will be just right for the change you give.”

“But, don’t you remember, you’ve already promised to look after the bookstall? You sent us that big box of books months ago, with some of your own books in—which I want you to autograph, by the way. So I was going to ask you if at the same time you’d manage the jumble corner—the two things would go very well together.”

I agreed with her heartily.

“Oh, you know I don’t mean anything like that!” she added hastily. “I only meant that you could more easily turn from selling lovely books, to dispose of one of your own done-with-but-still-charming coats and skirts, for instance, than if you had to cut up for the refreshment stall, and return with buttery fingers to respond to the rush there will be for your autograph.”

“Add the postcards to the books,” I said, trying to be equally amiable, “and Abigail will gladly run the jumble corner; she will be smarter at it than you or I.”

Abigail appeared as soon as her ladyship had gone. The farmeress who supplied us with milk was waiting in the kitchen to know if I wanted extra milk morning and evening in future, on account of company; as, if so, she would save it specially. She was experiencing a shortage of milk, “Hussy” having run dry, and “Clover,” for some unknown reason that I hadn’t time to listen to, not doing her lactic duty as befitted her station in life.

Emphatically I said that I should not want any extra milk—and a few other things.

I resumed my work.

Ten minutes later there was yet another interruption. This time it was the owner of the Buff Orpingtons, who had arrived at the back door to inquire if I was wanting any eggs—she’d brought eight with her, and expected another one to-night, which she’d send up—her hens had just started laying again, etc.

I fairly blessed the individual who had first set going the fable that I was expecting visitors.

I told Abigail that it was a matter of perfect indifference to me whether all the fowls in the district did, or did not, accommodatingly lay nine, or even ten, eggs for my especial benefit; but what did matter to me was whether I could, or could not, get nine or even ten minutes of uninterrupted peace, in order to finish my letters before the postman arrived. (He always calls obligingly at five o’clock for my afternoon mail.) And I requested that she would kindly take in any and everything that came during the next hour (so long as it didn’t need paying for!); only, for pity’s sake, would she cease opening that door and seeking advice on the subject.

After that I was left severely alone. From time to time I heard voices in the rear; there was one very loud series of bumps and bangs—I concluded it was the missionary report being introduced to the table. But I worked on, and had just sealed up my last budget of proofs, and addressed it to the printers, when the postman appeared. I heaved a sigh at the amount of stuff he carried away. The shower had passed over without even damping the blossoms. I would have some tea, and then start watering.

The postman was speaking to someone at the gate. No, it wasn’t Abigail. I heard him say, “Yes; this is Rosemary Cottage.” I was gathering up my papers as footsteps dragged themselves along the path—“dragged” is the only word for it—and before I had time to step outside to see who was there, two female forms, one ample and one spare, made for the door opening into the living-room, precipitated themselves into the room, and sank into the nearest chairs, in the last stages of panting exhaustion; while the ample one, in a coat and skirt of a large black and white plaid, buttoned and piped with cerise, exclaimed—

“At last! Well, of all the out-of-the-way forsaken places! We’ve been tramping nearly all day, trying to get here from that wretched station! We must have walked miles—miles—up and down hill, only it was all uphill; we found ourselves in woods with no possibility of ever getting out again; we got into lanes that ended nowhere, and when we got there it was the wrong place; we tried to take a short cut across some fields, and got stuck in a bog; we met a flock of wild cows, and the top of that hedge positively ran into me like needles. When we did chance to find a house, hoping it was yours, it never was; the people always told us to go on and ask further directions at the next house we came to, but each time there wasn’t another house. Why ever didn’t we take that fly at the station! But there, he could never have driven us over all the huge stone walls we’ve had to climb! We’ve been walking for hours on end—hours—haven’t we, dear?”

“Dear” nodded feebly. She was leaning back in the easy-chair with closed eyes. Her hat—of a remarkable shape—was trimmed with what looked like a kitchen flue-brush standing straight upright at the back; at least, it would have been upright if her hat hadn’t shifted askew; at the moment the flue-brush was inclining towards her left ear. Her costume was mustard colour, with spasms of black. She must have been very pleased with it when she bought it, otherwise she could never have induced herself to get inside it!

I soon found that the ample one did not require any reply other than the feeble nod, as it would have impeded her eloquence. She went on—

“I think, if you don’t mind, we won’t go upstairs till we’ve had some tea. We are absolutely prostrate, aren’t we, dear?” The flue-brush dipped slightly. “Could we have some tea at once?”

“Certainly,” I said with alacrity. I had already decided that tea was the only possible way to relieve the strain of the situation, and I rang the bell.

Abigail, after one comprehensive glance at the callers, fetched my very best afternoon tea-cloth, which she displayed on the table to the utmost advantage, that not an Irish inlet or a bit of lace border should be lost on the visitors. When she does not approve of any callers, or does not consider them quite in keeping with the family traditions, she invariably makes a terrific splash in front of them, getting out the special silver and the finest china, and serving with an air of withering superiority, as though she said, “Behold! this is how we live every day; very different from what you’ve been accustomed to!”

The tiresomeness of it is that when intimate friends call, who really matter, the handmaiden treats the tea-table most casually; they evidently don’t count if they are known to be above reproach!

From the look she gave the strangers, I knew we should have it all, and we did! She was wonderfully quick in getting both the tea and her smartest cap and apron. She put as much silver as she could squeeze on the table; she got out some egg-shell china plates for the bread and butter, and the old cut-glass for the preserves. She opened new jars of plum, black-currant, strawberry and raspberry jam; she turned out preserved ginger into a blue Chinese bowl; she put lemon-curd into a quaint brown dish, and honey in a lustre saucer. She hunted out all the cake we possessed, and opened a tin of apricots; she mashed up sardines with Worcester sauce, and heaped it on pale lettuce leaves, and she garnished some thin slices of ham most artistically with lemon and cucumber and flowering sprigs of rosemary. All this while the ample one was explaining to me how marvellously things were managed in London, the miles you could ride in a motor-bus for twopence, the cleanliness and speed and safety of the Tube, the ever-recurring convenience of a halfpenny in a tramcar, and the luxury of a taxi; and then more moans to think of the miles they had covered without meeting either motor-bus, Tube, tramcar or taxi.

When the table seemed on the very verge of breaking down with its abundance, and they had just drawn up their chairs, Abigail asked in clear tones that the visitors were bound to hear, “Would you wish me to bring in the cold duck, madam?” (“Madam” indicates company; “ma’am” is ordinary every-day.) I wasn’t exactly anxious to bestow my to-morrow’s dinner on the strangers, for I had reckoned to make the duck do for twice; but, of course, under the circumstances, I was bound to ask sweetly, “Oh, would you care for a little roast duck? It’s cold,” I added, by way of disqualifying the joint a little in their eyes. Fortunately they preferred ham, but it was satisfactory that at least they knew we had roast duck in the larder.

After sitting up and taking a little nourishment, the wilted ones revived perceptibly, and even began to be gracious. I am afraid I am not very fond of the graciousness of that type of woman; she does get it so mixed up with patronage. But I buoyed myself up with the thought that perchance I was entertaining angels unawares—though they didn’t look like it!

The ample one continued to be voluble. I did not interrupt her with questions, because I find it is usually as well to let a situation explain itself; it usually does in time. Besides, I didn’t quite know what to say. I couldn’t exactly ask, “Who are you? where have you come from? and why have you singled me out for this particular visitation?” Yet the longer I waited, the more awkward it became to open inquiries.

“You have a very well-trained maid, I see,” the large plaid continued, “that is to say, for the country”—with emphasis, to show me that there were obvious deficiencies, only she was willing to make allowances for them. “It’s the first thing I always notice in a house. We are used to such excellent service—most excellent service, aren’t we, dear?”

Dear agreed, but not very heartily; she seemed to ponder for a moment before she said her customary “Yes.”

“That is one reason why I always hesitate about leaving home.” (How I wished she’d hesitated a little longer! The sun was getting behind the fir-trees, and I did so want to start watering!) “You have some garden, I see, but it wants planning, doesn’t it? I wish you could see ours at home; it would give you some ideas. We have a man in occasionally; but we always superintend him ourselves. I’ll tell you how we have it arranged. In the centre is a square lawn, and in the middle of this we have a round bed with scarlet geraniums in the centre, and a ring of calceolarias round them, and then outside that, at the edge of the bed, you understand, all round, you know, we have lobelias, little blue flowers, you know. You’ve no idea how bright and effective it is. And then in the border all round the garden by the fences, we have standard roses about a couple of yards apart, and a row of scarlet geraniums. It’s so bright, and doesn’t cost so much when you buy them by the dozen.

“Your ceiling is very low, isn’t it?—still, for a cottage, it isn’t a bad-sized room; and I see you’ve made the best of it with your little bits of things put about.” I do wish you could have heard the charming, indulgent condescension with which she said “your little bits of things”! “Though I don’t think I’ve ever seen yellow walls before—very quaint, of course, but—er—rather peculiar. Don’t you think so, dear?”

Dear said she did. But I don’t know why, seeing that she was carrying about more yellow on her mustard person than I had in the whole of the house!

“I wish you could see our lovely dining-room at home,” the plaid continued. I murmured inarticulations, as there was a pause where I was evidently intended to say something. “It has a dark red paper on the wall. We have just furnished it with fumed oak. I think fumed oak is so artistic. We have a most handsome sideboard that will only just stand across one end of the room. I don’t mind telling you that it cost fifty pounds originally, but as the people to whom it belonged were a little unfortunate, we got it—well, we didn’t give quite that much for it; but you’d never know. It was just as good as new. And we have aspidistras and a beautiful palm in copper flower-pots—really exquisite works of art they are; and they go so well with the fumed oak, don’t they, dear?”

By the time I had been taken over their beautiful drawing-room, we had finished tea—happily, for I already saw a beautiful best bedroom suite looming ahead.

Having made a most excellent, not to say solid, meal, the voluble one shoved her chair back and said—

“I feel all the better for that cup of tea. Now, I think, if you’ll show us the way, we’ll go upstairs and have a good wash, and make ourselves presentable—not that you dress much for dinner, I suppose?”

I conclude I, too, was all the better for my cup of tea, for I felt myself warming to the work—and I led the way washstandwards most cordially. I didn’t take them out into the hall to the more modern staircase, I opened the door in the corner of the room, and revealed the steep stone stairs; and you should have heard their gurgles and squeals.

“Oh, dearest, do look. Isn’t it primitive? And do you go up and down this every day?”

“Oh, no,” I couldn’t help replying. “We only use this when visitors are here. On ordinary occasions we get in and out of the bedroom windows, and hop down the honeysuckle.”

She drew herself up reprimandingly; she evidently wished me to understand that, though she was willing to treat me as an equal so long as I behaved myself, she couldn’t allow any undue familiarity on my part.

“I don’t suppose you would see anything unusual in such an approach to the upper storeys, having been used to it all your life,” she said distantly; “but accustomed as we are to our magnificent staircase at home—wide enough to drive up a carriage and pair, isn’t it, dear?”—

“Er—nearly——” (Dear was the more truthful of the two, I fancy.)

“—And our beautiful pile carpet, in rich reds and blues, and the thickest of stair-pads underneath, till you would think you were walking on real Turkey carpet, this naturally strikes us as—how shall I put it so as not to hurt your feelings?—as—as very humorous, you know!”

“I quite understand,” I said, as we entered my bedroom.

She walked straight over to the window and looked out.

“Not a house to be seen anywhere,” she exclaimed dismally, “whichever way you look; nothing in sight but those everlasting tree-covered hills.”

As she seemed inclined for a lengthy soliloquy, I poured out some water and indicated the soap-dish, as politely as I knew how, to Dear, who had taken off her hat and coat, and seemed almost grateful for my attentions. I noticed that Abigail had been up and had adorned the towel-horse with my finest damask towels with embroidered ends, and had got out a rare and treasured bedspread made entirely of lace, that had just been sent me as a present from Venice, and had put it over the bed in place of the old-world patchwork quilt that I infinitely prefer in the cottage; it was so much more in keeping with the surroundings.

The ample one turned with a sigh from the depressing outlook that was so deficient in motor-buses and halfpenny car rides and taxis and houses, and said, evidently striving to make the best of a bad job, “At any rate you’ve tried to make it look as nice as you can inside. Do you know, I rather like that bedspread”—as though conveying a real favour on the article in question. “It reminds me of an exquisite bedspread we have at home something like it, only ours is linen, with shamrocks on it in solid embroidery.” And she flung down her coat and other impedimenta on the top of the lace in a way that made me tremble for its safety. “It’s something like ours—don’t you think so, dear?”

Dear had her face in the soft delicious lather of the rainwater, and didn’t reply.

“But”—at this point transformation came over the black and white plaid—“I’ve only just noticed it! This is a double bed! Look, dear, it’s a DOUBLE bed! And I most distinctly said in my letter it was imperative that we have two single beds; the same room would do, I said—no need to go to the expense of two rooms—but on no account a double bed. As I can’t possibly rest unless I have the bed to myself—I’m a very light sleeper, whereas my friend sleeps rather heavily, not to say—er—sonorously, don’t you, dear?—I must simply insist that you have this bed taken down and two single ones put up in its place. Had I seen the rooms before I engaged them I shouldn’t have taken a place with such a desolate outlook; but as we’ve had the expense of coming here, I don’t mind staying if you undertake to have the beds changed; and they must both be feather beds, too. Now, can you do this?”

“I’m afraid I can’t!” I said. “But if——”

“There can be no ifs; I put everything quite clearly in my letter. I’ve got a copy of it here. I wrote——”

“My dear lady, if you will sit down in that easy-chair, we’ll make everything still clearer.” She was beginning to prance around the room.

Dear, unmoved, was having a very thorough wash. So the light sleeper sank into the chair and rummaged in her hand-bag, presumably for the copy of the letter in question.

I tried to speak as lightly and soothingly as possible, for she was fairly bursting with indignation! “Now, please understand that I am delighted to give a meal to any wayfarer who, like yourself, arrives hungry and tired at my door. I’m glad for them to come in and have a rest, and even a wash and brush up, if they want it. But, when an absolute stranger, of whom I know nothing, demands my own bed, and my feather bed into the bargain, then I must protest! That feather bed is one of my most cherished possessions!”

“But you expected me?”—sitting bolt upright.

“I certainly did not!”

“Didn’t I write and tell you we would arrive to-day?”

“I’ve neither heard of you, nor from you, in my life before!”

“But this is Rosemary Cottage?”

“It is.”

“Then you must be Miss Flabbers!”—with an air of finality.

“I’m sorry, but I’m not!”

At this, Dear dropped the soap with a sudden splosh into the water and looked round in frozen astonishment. (The merest wraith of it remained two hours later when Abigail emptied the water. It was a new cake, too!)

At the name of Flabbers, light came. Miss Flabbers is a gentlewoman in somewhat reduced circumstances, who lives in a cottage a good mile and a half away. Presumably she was going to add to her income by taking in boarders.

“If it’s Miss Flabbers whom you are wanting,” I continued, filling up a painful silence, “her house is called Rose May Cottage. I expect you got the names confused in your mind.”

“There! It’s all your fault,” said the ample one, turning irritably to her companion; “you said it was Rose May Cottage when you read the first letter: but I said that was an absurd name, and it must be Rosemary it was intended for—country people do write so badly. I do wish, dear, you would be careful to be more accurate; if only you had said the right name I might have been saved all this trouble—and expense, because of course I shall insist on paying for our tea——” (she didn’t though!) “and think how many miles I’ve walked, and now I suppose I’ve to do it all again. How I wish I’d listened to that old man at the station and gone with——”

She paused suddenly and threw up her hands; and then there arose that cry common to all womankind the world over, when they are weary with their pilgrimage, footsore and travel-stained; the cry that must have rent the air in the olden days when Sarai trailed after Abram across the plains of Mamre, even as it sounds to-day from Yokohama to Land’s End:

“Where’s our luggage?”

There was a perceptible gasp—and then, “Yes; where’s our luggage?” faintly echoed Dear, as she nervously clutched her gloves with feverish haste and pinned them on her head, and then wildly tried to get her arms into her hat.

“I expect it’s reposing peacefully in Miss Flabbers’ best bedroom,” I said assuringly. “At any rate it isn’t here!” as I saw signs that they were going to crawl under the bed in search of it. “The man would be sure to deliver it there, and——”

Abigail knocked at the door and asked if she could speak to me for a minute.

When I got outside she said, “There’s a person downstairs wants to see you particular, ma’am, or I wouldn’t have disturbed you.” Abigail divides all her sex into two classes, “persons” and “ladies,” and no one is more careful than she to see that “persons” don’t think more highly of themselves than their social status warrants.

I found a pleasant-faced woman who lives in a cottage near Miss Flabbers. “Please, ma’am, Miss Flabbers has lost two ladies rather suddint, and I wondered if you’d chanced to set eyes on ’em? Miss Flabbers is that worrit as never was; expected ’em by the eleven train, and I misdoubt me if the cutlets won’t be a bit heavy by now, though she’s had ’em over a saucepan of hot water ever since. She’s so upset she don’t know what to do, yet she can’t go out to look for ’em in case they turns up meanwhile. I thought it ’ud be just neighbourly if I went out for her and hunted around. I know they come by that train, for I see’d ’em myself at the station, puffeck ladies you’d have took ’em for, only they wouldn’t have a fly. They’re not friends, no, nor boarders, no, she wouldn’t think of having boarders, so reserved as she is; they’re what’s called paying guests. I know, because my son’s got a friend in the Hargus office, and he told him about an adver-tisement she put in, only you wouldn’t have known it was her, being only X Y Z on it, but the people at the Hargus knew as the X Y Z meant her, though how they should know puzzles me, and they send on the letters to her. But she’s kep’ it very private; no one knew they was coming, so I wouldn’t dream of mentioning X Y Z to a soul. I’ve tracked ’em up here. Everybody all over the Common and even up to the Crag Farm has a-seed them, they’ve scoured the county for miles round. You’d be sure to rekernize them once you’d saw them——”

I should think so! E’en the slight harebell raised its head and stared after them whenever they passed it that afternoon, I’m certain.

By dint of shouting above her talking I managed to get her to hear that I had them safe and sound; and should be everlastingly grateful if she would take them off my hands and place them in the safe keeping of Miss Flabbers.

Then I fetched them down and introduced the neighbourly soul, who, you could see, felt elated at the distinction of being the one to take such costumes in tow.

“Better go out of the back door,” I said, “and up the garden to the top gate; it will save you a few steps.”

And then the ample one turned and said icily, “I suppose we must thank you for what you have done; but I do think you should have told us sooner who you were.” Yet I hadn’t told them even then!

It was as they were going out of the back door that Dear amazed us by falling unexpectedly to her knees and affectionately clasping a dark object that I had not seen in the dim recess of the lobby.

“Here’s our trunks!” she shrieked hysterically.

And then both those women glared things unspeakable at me. They knew now, what they had only suspected before, that I was a deeply-dyed villainess with designs on them and their property.

“What’s this? Why wasn’t I told about it?” I inquired of Abigail, who, naturally, was not missing a word.

“Old Bob brought them while you were busy. He said they were for here, so of course I took them in, madam, as you said you were not to be disturbed,” with an injured sniff, “and I’ve had no opportunity to tell you since.”

The two, true to the instincts of their sex, had promptly seated themselves on the trunks, and I feared they had no intention of budging unless the trunks went with them. But the neighbourly person was anxious to be on the move; she wanted the kudos of walking through the village with them in the broad daylight, so she said—

“They’ll be all right; my ’usband’ll come round for them soon as we get back. Now don’t you worrit the least little bit.”

Thus they were got off at last.

“Puffeck ladies,” I said to myself as I seized the brown pitcher and the water-can, and went out to the spring.