To divert the child I asked her abruptly what she was going to do. "You must go out, Bess," I said, "if the sun shines, and take poor Mouse." Mouse looked at me reproachfully as I spoke--she understood my reference to outdoor exercise, but hated the idea of wetting her feet, besides which she considered going out with any one except me beneath her dignity. Of all boarhounds that I have ever known, mine is the most self-indulgent and the most self-satisfied of my acquaintance. Besides which, secretly I felt convinced she was hopeful of sharing my meals, and lying later on the bed when no one was looking. "Old Mouse is no good," retorted Bess, disdainfully. "She only follows grown-up people. If I lived in heaven," she added dreamily, "I should have a real, live dog, that would walk with me, although I was only a child cherubim." "Well," I pursued, "but what are you going to do?" "Me?" inquired Bess, with small attention to grammatical niceties. "When I've done my lessons I shall go out with Burbidge. We are going to put up cocoa-nuts for tom-tits, and hang up some pieces of fat bacon for the starlings, besides which we are going to sweep round the sundial for the rooks. Papa said they were to be fed, and we are going to do it--Burbidge and me." "What will Miss Weldon do?" I asked. "Oh, she will read," with great contempt said Bess; "she reads, and never sees anything. Burbidge says that there are many who would know more if they read less." "See after my canaries," I cried, as Bess flew off to finish her lessons, buoyed up with the hope later of going out with our old gardener. Outside I heard him, our faithful old retainer of some seventy years, tramping heavily on the red Ercal gravel. He was about to sweep a place by the sundial on which to feed my birds. [Sidenote: FEEDING THE BIRDS] Birds of all kinds come to this outside dining-hall--tom-tits, the beautiful little blue and green variety, perky and no larger than a wren; wrens with deep guttural bell-like notes and brown tails up-tilted; robins with flaming breasts; ill-bred, iridescent, chattering starlings; a few salmon-breasted chaffinches, the tamest of all wild birds; spotted thrushes, and raven-hued blackbirds; besides an army of grey sparrows, very tame, very cheeky, and very quarrelsome. Added to all these were the rooks, and a flight of grey-pated hungry jackdaws who uttered short sharp cries when they saw the corn and scraps of bread, but who dared not approach as near as the other and smaller birds.