The consideration of the kitchen roof reminds me of poor Delia, from whom I had a letter this morning. She has rejoined her husband in a frontier outpost, where the Department of Military Works had somewhat neglected their quarters. Their position--that of Captain and Mrs. Delia--in this weather is trying to a degree. In a particularly heavy storm recently the rain came in upon them in such floods that they were obliged to take refuge under the table. Imagine the knock of a stranger at the gate under such circumstances! It was better than that--it was the knock of a wayfaring Sapper come to _inspect the bungalow_. How great must Delia’s joy have been in making him comfortable under the table! And there they sat, all three, for fifteen mortal hours, subsisting, for the cook-house was carried away, upon ginger-nuts and chocolates and a bottle of anchovies. The more remote service of Her Majesty our Queen-Empress involves some curious situations. The Sapper, Delia writes, went forth no longer a stranger; fifteen hours spent together under a table would naturally make a bond for life. One might also trust Delia, whose mission is everywhere to strike a note of gaiety and make glad the heart of man, to give the circumstance a character sufficiently memorable. Almost, if four would not have been a crowd, I could have wished myself there too, under the table. CHAPTER XVI I have heard crying in the nursery; it is the most babyish and plaintive repetition of the old birds’ note, but it grows daily stronger, more importunate. The parent birds utter six notes, dwelling on the fourth in long musical appeal, the babies have learned only the fourth, the one that really tells when you are hungry; it is a little pipe, ridiculous to tears. The pretty little warbler pursues his gambols more energetically than ever before the door of our Eastern bungalow now, his wife comes with him and they are more punctual than we are at meals, always in the verandah, on the impatient hop, for breakfast and lunch and tea, though dinner-time finds them reluctantly in bed. I will go so far as to say that if I am late in the morning the father bird comes to my window and asks whether I am aware that I am keeping two families waiting--if that is not his idea why does he so markedly whistle there? Further I expect to be believed when I say that I whistle him my apologies and he replies, and we frequently have quite long conversations through the window before I actually appear. They are such a young couple and so absorbed in their domestic affairs that we take a great interest in them. It is a delight to find out a bird’s doings and plans, and his nest is the only clue. At other times how private they are, the birds! We know that they are about, and that is all.