"Ah, well!" said my aunt easily. "If she has such a temper, it brings its own punishment." "And the punishment of a good many others also, unluckily," said Andrew, and then the conversation turned to other things. After supper Andrew proposed that we should go up and see the gardens. The elders preferred sitting in the house, but we young ones went out, after proper injunctions to keep moving and not to stay out after the dew began to fall. Gardening, it appeared, had also been a fashion with these curious Corbets, who seem to me from the earliest records to have made their homes as pleasant as possible, only to run as far-away from them as the limits of the world would allow. The flower-beds were in their spring beauty, and were filled with rare plants and flowers, which I never saw anywhere else. The climate of Cornwall is very mild, so that the myrtle grows to a great size out of doors, and many tender trees flourish which will not live at all about London. I particularly admired a tall shrub With red-veined leaves and covered with little scarlet bells in immense profusion, and asked its name. "I cannot tell you that," said Andrew. "My father brought it from the West Indies, where it grows very large. This other bush, with bright scarlet flowers and broad leaves, is from the Cape of Good Hope, but it will bear no frost, so we take it in, in the winter." "What great rosemary and lavender plants!" said I. "They make me think of what Jeanne has told me about Provence, where they grow wild." "They do fairly well, though the place is damp for them. See, yonder is a tulip-tree. Is it not a grand one? The Americans make great use of the wood, which, though soft, is very lasting for some purposes." "What a pity to cut down such beautiful trees!" said I. Andrew laughed. "Trees are the great enemies over there," said he. "It did look terribly wasteful to me to see great logs of bard maple, chestnut, and oak, rolled into heaps and burned in the field, just to get rid of them." "What a shame!" said Betty. "Why not at least give them to the poor for fuel. Goody Penaluna would be glad enough of such a log." "If Goody Penaluna were there, she would have wood enough for the asking," replied Andrew. "One can hardly say there are any poor, for though they have often had hard times enough, yet it mostly comes share and share alike." "I believe Andrew hath a hankering after those same colonies in his secret soul," said Betty. "You will find yourself transplanted thither some time or other, Agnes." Again I felt annoyed. I did not know why. "Do not call me Agnes; call me Vevette," said I. "That is the name I have always been used to." "But Agnes is so much prettier. Vevette is like a nickname," objected Betty. "It is a sort of pet name, I suppose—short for Genevieve," remarked Margaret. "If Vevette likes it best, she certainly has a right to choose."