They were rowing quietly up the stream, lowering their heads now and then to clear the drooping tresses of a willow. The verdant banks, the perpetual willows, were beautiful, but with a monotonous beauty. It was the ripe middle of the year, when all things are of one rich green—meadows and woods and hills—and in a country chiefly pastoral there must needs be a touch of sameness in the landscape. Here and there a spire showed above the trees, or a gray stone mansion stood boldly out upon the green hillside. Daphne had so arranged cushions and wraps upon the principal seat as to conceal the mutilated name. Gerald rowed stroke, she sat in the bows, and Madoline reclined luxuriously in the stern with the Maltese terrier Fluff in her lap. ‘If we are lucky we shall be at the Abbey an hour and a half before your aunt and her ponies,’ said Gerald. ‘It was extremely obliging of her to volunteer the inestimable boon of her advice, but I fancy we should get on quite as well without her.’ ‘It would have been unkind to let her think we didn’t want her,’ said Madoline deprecatingly. ‘That is so like you, Lina; you will go through life putting up with people you don’t care about, rather than wound their feelings,’ said Gerald carelessly. ‘Aunt Rhoda is my father’s only sister. I am bound to respect her.’ ‘I’ve no doubt the Old Man of the Sea was a very estimable person in the abstract,’ said Gerald, ‘but Sindbad shunted him at the first opportunity. Don’t look so distressed, dearest. Aunt Rhoda shall patronise us, and dictate to us all our lives, if it please you. By-the-by, what has become of your devoted slave and ally, Turchill? I expected to find him on the premises when I arrived at South Hill.’ ‘He went up to London last week with his mother, to make a round of the theatres and picture-galleries. They will be home in a few days, I daresay.’ ‘I wonder he can exist out of Warwickshire. He is so thoroughly bucolic, so permeated by the flavour of his native soil.’ ‘He is very kind and good and true-hearted,’ protested Daphne, flushing indignantly; ‘and he is your old friend and kinsman. I wonder you can speak so contemptuously of him, Mr. Goring.’ ‘What, my vixenish little Pop—Daphne,’ cried Gerald, colouring at this slip of the tongue, ‘is it thus the cat jumps? I would not underrate Edgar for worlds. He is out and away the best fellow I know; but, however much you may admire him, little one, that his mind is essentially bucolic is a fact—and facts are stubborn things.’ ‘You have no right to say that I admire him. I respect and esteem him, and I am not ashamed to own as much, though you may think it a reason for laughing at me,’ retorted Daphne, still angry. ‘He taught me to row this very boat. He used to get up every morning at a ridiculously early hour, in order to be at South Hill in time to give me a lesson before breakfast.’ ‘A man might do twice as much for your _beaux yeux_, and yet deem it no self-sacrifice.’