"Lovers are different to what they were when I was a young fellow," said Sir John. "We were a bit chivalrous and attentive then. Pooh! So they are now. There's no harm in the lad. It isn't such a bad thing to keep his body in a state of perfection--real perfection of health and strength. Makes a young fellow moral and pure-minded; but I wish he would devote himself more to Glynne. Take her out more; she looks too pale." "Hang him! I wish he had been at Jericho," muttered the subject of Sir John's thoughts. "Let's see, I can keep along all the way in the woods now. I sha'n't meet any one there." The prophecy concerning people held good for a quarter of an hour or so, and then, turning rapidly into an open fir glade, Rolph found out that being prophetic does not pay without a long preliminary preparation, and an ingenious consideration of probabilities and the like, for he suddenly came plump upon the major, stooping down, trowel in hand--so suddenly, in fact, that he nearly fell over him, and the two started back, the one with a muttered oath, the other with words of surprise. "Why, I didn't expect to find you in this out-of-the-way place," said the major. "By Jove, that's just what I was going to say," cried Rolph. "Not raw beef-steaks this time, is it?" said the major with a grim look full of contempt. "Steaks--raw steaks. I don't understand you." "This is rough woodland; you are not training now, are you?" said the major, carefully placing what looked like a handful of dirty little blackish potatoes in his fishing creel. "Training? Well, yes, of course I am. Keeping myself up to the mark," retorted Rolph. "A soldier, in my opinion, ought to be the very perfection of manly strength." "Well, yes," said the major, rubbing the soil off one of his dirty little truffles, and then polishing his bright little steel trowel with a piece of newspaper, "but the men of my time did pretty well with no other training than their military drill." "_Autres_--I forget the rest," said Rolph. "I never was good at French. It means other fellows had other manners in other times, major. Got a good haul of toadstools?" "No, sir, I have not got a good haul of toadstools to-day; but I have unearthed a few truffles. Should you like a dish for dinner?" "Thanks, no. Not coming my way, I suppose?" "No," said the major. "I think I shall trudge back." "Ho!" exclaimed Rolph. "Well, then, I'll say _ta-ta_, till dinner-time;" and he went off at a good swinging pace. "Almost looks as if they were watching me," muttered the young officer, as he trudged on. "Tchah! no! The old boys wouldn't do that, either of them;" and he turned into one of the thickest portions of the wood. The major kept on rubbing his little steel trowel till long after it was dry, and then slowly sheathed it, as if it were a sword, before going thoughtfully on hunting up various specimens of the singular plants that he made his study.