"I hope not. That bugbear must have been exploded. If I come down to see the budding year, dear George, could you--I mean, could you tell me where to go? I want to write a paper for the R.H.S. I began one on the Kentish pear and apple bloom last year, with a County Council lecturer who came down that he might be certain which was which. But the wind chopped round suddenly, and we got snowed up, and naturally all the fruit failed that season. But the year before that, there would have been a splendid crop, except for that gale on the 1st of September; I daresay you remember it. When I went to make an estimate of the saving to the country by growing its own fruit, with my usual luck I could find no proper specimens. The walks were so strewn with green fruit that my feet were too tender to get along among the heaps, without two men with brooms in front of me; and even so I could scarcely get upstairs that night. But how is our good friend Bandilow?" "Becoming rather nervous, I am afraid. His family did their best to keep it from him about that other poor grower towards Godalming, who made that frightful application of his gooseberry-knife. But poor Bandilow had a sharpish tiff with his mother-in-law, as he could not see his way to keep her; and the cruel woman sent him full account of the inquest, with the lunatic doctor's evidence, and the balance-sheet of several years' jam-boiling, underlined in crimson ink. He told all the parish at the Bell-tap on Friday, that the only plantation he should ever make now must be in a box, and grow up into a stone." "I hope not, I trust not most heartily," said the Earl, brushing his eyes, for he was very tender-hearted. "But let us turn to more cheerful subjects. I feel sadly upset about it. Let us have a glass of port." After that he appeared a little stronger, and gladly undertook to forward any letter of mine to a friend of his who was attached to our embassy in Russia, and he felt no doubt that as soon as Sûr Imar appeared in that capital, it would be placed in his hands. Without losing an hour I wrote my letter, and left it in his charge, for there could be no harm in being too early, whereas it would be fatal to all my hopes, if I were even an hour too late. My letter was short, and not too cordial; for really, when one came to reflect upon all the circumstances, my Lesghian friends had scarcely allowed me fair play, or so much as a chance to right myself. No man can be sure what he would have done, in a case which has not hit him in the breast, although we are very fond of talking so. Nevertheless, when I put a bit of spirit into my own consideration of myself, I could not help thinking that I would have given any one who fell into a sudden cloud of dust with me, more opportunity to clear the dirt away, and a fairer chance of asking from whose chimney it had come.