Sunflowers and nasturtiums take as kindly to bureaucratic conditions. We consider them fellows of the baser sort and plant them all behind, the sunflower tall along the lattice between us and the road above, the nasturtiums scrambling and blazing down the khud-side beneath. The nasturtiums make a mere cloth of gold, there is not much entertainment to be got out of them; but on heavily pouring days when I have betaken myself to the attic-window level with them, I have found good company in the sunflowers. Thoughtfully considered, the sunflower has no features to speak of; an eye, and you have mentioned them all, yet many comedians might envy that furnishing. His personality is evasive; I have idly tried to draw him, and have reproduced a sunflower but no gentleman. It lies in a nuance of light across that expressive round, which may say anything, or merely stare. One looks intelligently to the west, another hopefully to the east. Two little ones cower together; another glances confidently up at its tall mother, another folds its leaves under its chin and considers the whole question of life with philosophy. On a particularly wet day I find a note to the effect that a small sunflower called across to me, “I am just out this morning and it’s pouring. A nice look-out, but I’ll try to bear up.” That was the day on which I distinctly saw a sunflower shut its eye. With Tiglath-Pileser everything is secondary at present to the state of the drains and the kitchen roof. The drains are open channels down the khud-side, the kitchen roof is of tin, and when it leaks enough to put the fire out the cook comes and complains. He is a Moog cook, which means that he prefers to avoid the disagreeable, so he waits until it is actually out before he says anything. When, between showers, we walk abroad upon the shelf my footsteps naturally tend to the border where the wild puce-coloured Michaelmas daisies are thickening among the goldenrod, and his would take the straightest direction to the plumber and the coolies who are making another stone ditch for him. To me there is no joy in repairing a kitchen roof, nor can I ever decide whether it should be tarred or painted, while to Tiglath-Pileser the union of Michaelmas daisies and goldenrod, though pleasing, is a matter of trivial importance. So we have agreed upon the principle of a fair partition of interest. He comes and assumes moderate enthusiasm before my hedge of purple and yellow; I go and pronounce finally that nothing could be uglier than either paint or tar for the kitchen roof. By such small compromises as these people may hold each other in the highest estimation for years.