I said I felt it in me that I should start keeping deer as soon as I landed, and there was more sense in doing that than in reading a Time Table, for instance! Virginia protested a Time Table was absolutely essential, else how would you ever be able to get away when you wanted to? And you never knew _when_ you might be summoned to anyone’s funeral in a hurry, and was she supposed to be cut off from _all_ human enjoyment? Whereas no one could possibly want a Student’s Song Book, when they couldn’t sing two notes in tune; and, also, why Mrs. Hemans, might she venture to ask? “Yes, who would dream of carting around a Mrs. Hemans in these days?” I scoffed. “The frontispiece engraving of Mrs. Hemans always reminded me of mother’s Aunt Matilda,” said Ursula impressively. “I only saw her twice, but on the first occasion she gave me a doll, and on the second a blue and white bead necklace; I’ve got three of the beads left, in my workbox. And I’ve always loved beads, and I loved her in consequence, and I wouldn’t dream of being parted from Mrs. Hemans. And, in any case, why bring a Dictionary?” “Because I may require to look up a more expressive word occasionally, or enlarge my flow of vocabulary,” Virginia explained. “And I conclude I’m not expected to be absolutely dumb when we get there!” Of course, I don’t mean to imply that these are necessarily the books we should have named had we sat down thoughtfully to compile a list most representative of our tastes and needs; but whatever list I had made, I’m sure I should have included the volumes I named; and it goes to show that the books that make an individual appeal to us are not necessarily those that our friends expect us to name. The library catalogue was never completed, for, before we had time further to criticize each other’s preferences, we were pulled up short by a sound. We all stopped our chatter on an instant, for surely and certainly there could be no mistaking it, there was the ring of an iron spade chinking on stone! When last we had looked out, just after breakfast, not a stone had been visible for a spade to chink against in the whole vicinity. We flew to the door, and there, touching his hat with a smiling “Good morning, ma’am,” stood the elderly handy man who ought to have been in bed with his bad cold; and behold, a clear path to the lane. He had worked from the gate inwards, and we had been so busy with our discussions indoors, we had not heard him till he reached the porch.