How green and sweet the grass was! (Better than the carpet in the office.) I sat down on it and then turned over and lay with my chin resting in cupped hands. Through half-closed eyes, I studied the largest of the islands in the pond and speculated as to whether anyone--other than the unappreciative officials--had ever ventured into its jungle-like foliage. A little black duck came out from one of the miniature bays in the island, dived, and reappeared a dozen yards further out. It dived again; and I pictured it beneath the green water, searching for fat worms in the mud at the bottom. "The open-air and--freedom!" I thought. "How good it is to be alive!" Another pipe of tobacco gone! When I had refilled it, I got up and crossed over to one of the drinking fountains and swallowed a great draught of ice cold water. (The water is wonderful at Kew! So clear and fresh and cold!) I visited the green-houses and hot-houses. Still more visions of Africa. . . . The heat was a little stifling, perhaps; but, who cared? I spent over a quarter of an hour in the orchid house--until the attendants apparently grew suspicious and the perfume half intoxicated me. Then, the open air again and still another pipe! It was now eleven o'clock and the sun shone from a cloudless blue sky--the same old sun that I should see in Gaboon and through the tree tops of the African forests. . . . (A strange but comforting thought, that--how the dear old sun follows its children into the uttermost parts of the earth. Thank Heaven gorillas didn't live at the North Pole! I hated cold.) Homewards I came at last. Down the gravel pathways and across smooth green lawns--(No "_Keep off the Grass_" notices in Kew Gardens!)--and between bushes laden with white, glistening blossoms, and by the side of tulip and hyacinth beds. And, everywhere, was the song of birds. . . . I tried, in a moment of voluntarily-imposed melancholy, to think of the office and clerkdom. But I couldn't grip or visualize it. And yet Africa seemed extraordinarily near and real. Behind some bushes on the left, I caught a glimpse of the African Crane--"Freddy," as Molly called him. He came striding along in that haughty and lady-like way of his--an ash-gray symbol of the true poetry of motion. I wondered if I should ever see his brothers and sisters in their native habitat. I strolled towards him, but he moved gracefully and disdainfully away. Probably, he despised me. What did I, a wretched civil servant, know of his life and ambitions? What right had I to pay a penny to come and gaze at him as if he was some curio in a museum?