It was a windy, sunny day. In shelter the heat was passionate, but in the open the wind scattered its fire. Every now and then a white cloud broad based, blue shadowed, travelled slowly along the sky-road after the forerunner small in the distance, and trailing over us a chill shade, a gloom which we watched creep on over the water, over the wood and the hill. These royal, rounded clouds had sailed all day along the same route, from the harbour of the South to the wastes in the Northern sky, following the swift wild geese. The brook hurried along singing, only here and there lingering to whisper to the secret bushes, then setting off afresh with a new snatch of song. The fowls pecked staidly in the farmyard, with Sabbath decorum. Occasionally a lost, sportive wind-puff would wander across the yard and ruffle them, and they resented it. The pigs were asleep in the sun, giving faint grunts now and then from sheer luxury. I saw a squirrel go darting down the mossy garden wall, up into the laburnum tree, where he lay flat along the bough, and listened. Suddenly away he went, chuckling to himself. Gyp all at once set off barking, but I soothed her down; it was the unusual sight of Lettie’s dark dress that startled her, I suppose. We went quietly into the kitchen. Mrs. Saxton was just putting a chicken, wrapped in a piece of flannel, on the warm hob to coax it into life; it looked very feeble. George was asleep, with his head in his arms on the table; the father was asleep on the sofa, very comfortable and admirable; I heard Emily fleeing up stairs, presumably to dress. “He stays out so late—up at the Ram Inn,” whispered the mother in a high whisper, looking at George, “and then he’s up at five—he doesn’t get his proper rest.” She turned to the chicks, and continued in her whisper—“the mother left them just before they hatched out, so we’ve been bringing them on here. This one’s a bit weak—I thought I’d hot him up a bit” she laughed with a quaint little frown of deprecation. Eight or nine yellow, fluffy little mites were cheeping and scuffling in the fender. Lettie bent over them to touch them; they were tame, and ran among her fingers. Suddenly George’s mother gave a loud cry, and rushed to the fire. There was a smell of singed down. The chicken had toddled into the fire, and gasped its faint gasp among the red-hot cokes. The father jumped from the sofa; George sat up with wide eyes; Lettie gave a little cry and a shudder; Trip rushed round and began to bark. There was a smell of cooked meat. “There goes number one!” said the mother, with her queer little laugh. It made me laugh too. “What’s a matter—what’s a matter?” asked the father excitedly. “It’s a chicken been and walked into the fire—I put it on the hob to warm,” explained his wife. “Goodness—I couldn’t think what was up!” he said, and dropped his head to trace gradually the border between sleeping and waking.