"How interested she was when I told her of the serious books I read, and of my daily occupations--moulding the candles, brewing the beer, carding wool, making butter, and then caring for the garden! She had never seen celery in trenches, she said, and would not know beans from gourds if she saw them growing. It seems that in England ladies have nothing to do with their gardens--when, indeed, they have any at all--save to pluck a rose now and then, or give tea to their gentlemen under the shrubbery when it is fine. And I told her of our quilting and spinning bees, and the coasting on clear winter evenings, and of watching the blacks on Pinkster night, and the picnics in the woods, and she vowed London had no pleasures like them. She was jesting though, I think. Oh, shall we ever go to London, papa?" "By all means, let us go," chuckled Mr. Stewart. "You would see something there she never saw--my grizzled old head upon Temple Bar. Shall we be off to-morrow? My neck tingles with anticipation." "Old tease!" laughed Daisy, patting his shoulder. "You know there have been no heads put there since long before I was born. Never flatter yourself that they would begin again now with yours. They've forgotten there was ever such a body as you." "Faith! the world doesn't go round so fast as you young people think. Only to-day I read in the London mail that two months ago one of the polls that had been there since '46 fell down; but if it was Fletcher's or Townley's no one can tell--like enough not even they themselves by this time. So there's a vacant spike now for mine. No, child--I doubt these old bones will ever get across the sea again. But who knows?--it may be your fortune to go some time." "Lady Berenicia says I must come to the Hall often, papa, while she is there," said the girl, returning to the subject which bewitched her; "and you must fetch me, of course. She admires you greatly; she says gentlemen in London have quite lost the fine manner that you keep up here, with your bow and your compliments. You must practise them on me now. We are to keep each other company as much as possible, she and I, while her husband and Douw go off together. You should have seen her mimic them--the two solemn, long-faced men boring each other in the depths of the wilderness." The talk had at last got around to me. Daisy laughed gayly at recollection of the London woman's jesting. Surely never a more innocent, less malicious laugh came from a maiden's merry lips, but it fell sourly on my ears. "It is easy for people to be clever who do not scruple to be disagreeable," I said, without much relevancy. "What is this, Douw?" Mr. Stewart turned half-way in his saddle and glanced inquiry back at me. "What is wrong with you? You were as glum all the evening long as a Tuscarora. Isn't the trip with Mr. Cross to your liking?" "Oh, ay! I shall be glad to go."