I have heard Mrs. Beehive say of one of our most prosperous neighbours that they had “struggled up from the Palmerston Road.” They were certainly a little battered and jaded when they got there: “there” being a handsome residential mansion on the edge of the Park. It has a tennis lawn, a vegetable garden, a garage, four entertaining rooms, ten bedrooms, butler’s pantry, electric light, ground-floor kitchens, and every modern convenience--altogether about as much material for annoyance and waste of time as can well be imagined. By the time Tom was sixteen and Anne fourteen, our doom was drawing near. In spite of my resistance, James and I were about to struggle up from the Palmerston Road; I saw it coming. Our pleasant little house was falling to bits over our heads. We were eight where we had been but four, and (this settled it) Ruth was getting angry. She wanted help in the kitchen, and there was nowhere to put any help at night. James, too, was bothered by the gramophone; Tom and Anne wanted a tennis lawn; nurse wanted a room where the dressmaker could sew (she made the nursery floor so bitty). Nurse even spoke of the bandboxes containing the winter hats as if they had recently broken out like a plague. When every one had displayed their grievances, I remembered that I wanted another room myself in which to escape from them--the aggrieved parties--a question-proof room if possible with only one door. I had thought of an underground suite of apartments like that of the Duke of Portland, with a glass roof. It would have been such a pleasure to watch the numerous legs of my tormentors as they ran about looking for me. I told the efficient female that we thought of moving, and she said: “Ah, I knew you would have to sooner or later.” I assured her that it was quite undecided, and that if we did move it would be into a smaller house. The odious creature smiled falsely, and said, of course that was the ideal life. They themselves never knew what peace was until they moved into a small house, and one really well-trained servant could run everything for eight people quite easily. That is all very well for her. She has given up making ices in boots and omelettes in hats, and now eats nothing but nuts. She is so vilely efficient that she secured from her harassed Maker the only sample he had of a patient husband who can and will digest anything. She kept the pattern and made a little outfit of children of the same convenient kind. Then, I suppose, no more were stocked, as, on the whole, there is no great demand for docile nut-eating men. They do not provide enough incident for the average household. When James was thoroughly fired with the struggling-up idea, he set his mind towards the topmost pinnacle of ambition. A house near the Park was not enough for him, we must move into the country. “Where does the country end and the county begin?” I asked. “The county, I understand, is the thing to aim at.”