Then there is the greenhouse. "From now onwards," he writes, "the greenhouse will meet with a more welcome appreciation than it has during the summer months. The chief plants in flower will be _Lantanas_, _Campanula pyramidalis_, _Zonal Pelargoniums_," and about twenty more. "Oh, they will, will they?" I thought, and opened the greenhouse door and looked in. Against the wall there were two or three mouldering peach-trees, and all over the roof and floor a riot of green tomatoes, a fruit which even when it becomes ruddy-faced I do not particularly like. In a single large pot stood a dissipated cactus, resembling a hedgehog suffering from mange. But what was even more bitter to me than all this ruin and desolation was the thought of the glorious deeds I might have been doing if the garden had been all right. Phrases from the book kept flashing to my eye. "Thoroughly scrub the base and sides of the pots, and see that the drainage-holes are not sealed with soil." How it thrilled the blood! "Damp the floors and staging every morning and afternoon, and see that the compost is kept uniformly moist." What a fascinating pursuit! "Feed the plants once a week with liquid manure." It went like a clarion call to the heart. And here I was condemned to _ennui_ and indolence when I might have been sitting up all night dosing the _Zonal Pelargoniums_ with hot beef-tea and taking the temperature of the _Campanula pyramidalis_. Even with the ruddy-faced fruits there would have been plenty to do. "Wooden trays with open lath bottoms made to slide into a framework afford the best means of storing apples and pears. The ripening of pears may be accelerated by enclosing them in bran or dry clean sand in a closed tin box." It did not say how often one was to clean out the cage, nor whether you put groundsel between the bars. I told the man next door of my sorrows. "Well, there 's plenty to do," he said. "Get a spade and dig the garden all over." Dig it all over indeed when I ought to be plucking nosegays of _Lysimachia clethroides_ and _Pyrethrum uliginosum_ to put in my buttonhole! I prefer to dream my dreams. EVOE. * * * * * [Illustration: _Mistress_. "SO IT'S THE CHAUFFEUR THAT'S GOING TO BE THE LUCKY MAN, MARY? I WAS UNDER THE IMPRESSION THAT THE BUTLER WAS THE FAVOURED ONE." _Cook_. "THAT WAS SO, MUM; BUT MR. WILLOUGHBY LET ME SLIP THROUGH HIS FINGERS."] * * * * * THE CABMAN AND THE COIN. "We must wait a minute or two for Sir Charles," said our hostess. "Everyone else is here," and she beamed around the room. The various _mauvais quart d'heure_ dialogues that this speech had interrupted were resumed, most of them switching on to the question of punctuality. And then a cab was heard to stop outside and after a minute or so, presumably spent in financial transactions, the bell rang and the knocker knocked.