Mr. Atherton laughed. "Perhaps you are right, Mrs. Mitford, though my weight is really a great drawback to my carrying out my views in regard to travel. You see, I am practically debarred from travelling in countries where the only means of locomotion is riding on horses. I could not find animals in any foreign country that would carry me for any distances. I might in England, I grant, find a weight-carrying cob capable of conveying twenty stone along a good road, but I might search all Asia in vain for such a horse, while as for Africa, it would take a dozen natives to carry me in a hammock. No, I suppose I shall go on wandering pretty nearly to the end of the chapter, and shall then settle down in quiet lodgings somewhere in the region of Pall Mall." Upon the day after his return from the inspection of the farm Wilfrid wrote home to his father describing the location, and saying that he thought it was the very thing to suit them. It would be a fortnight before an answer could be received, and during that time he set to work at Mr. Mitford's place to acquire as much knowledge as possible of the methods of farming in the colony. The answer arrived in due course, and with it came the two Grimstones. Wilfrid had suggested in his letter that if his father decided to take the farm the two men should be sent up at once to assist in adding to the hut and in preparing for their coming, and that they should follow a fortnight later. Mrs. Mitford also wrote, offering them a warm invitation to stay for a time with her until their own place should be ready for their occupation. Mr. Mitford had an inventory of the furniture of the hut, and this was also sent, in order that such further furniture as was needed might be purchased at Wellington. As soon as the letter was received, inclosing, as it did, a cheque for a hundred pounds, Wilfrid went over with the two Grimstones and took possession. Mr. Mitford, who was the magistrate and land commissioner for the district, drew up the papers of application for the plot of two hundred acres adjoining the farm, and sent it to Wellington for Mr. Renshaw's signature, and said that in the meantime Wilfrid could consider the land as belonging to them, as it would be theirs as soon as the necessary formalities were completed and the money paid. When Wilfrid started, two natives, whom Mr. Mitford had hired for him, accompanied him, and he also lent him the services of one of his own men, who was a handy carpenter. The Grimstones were delighted with the site of their new home. "Why, it is like a bit of England, Master Wilfrid! That might very well be the Thames there, and this some gentleman's place near Reading; only the trees are different. When we get up a nice house here, with a garden round it, it will be like home again."