I pushed aside the little green gate and walked up the tiny path amid a profusion of flowers whose names are as yet unknown to me. I promise myself to know them all ere long: to know their habits and their humours: to learn their secrets and the story of their lives; but that is for the future. Something almost as sweet and dainty as the flowers claimed my attention first. At the sound of the creaking gate, a dear old lady appeared at the door of the doll's house which was joined to my cottage and advanced to meet me. She had the pleasantest of faces, and was pink and pretty in spite of her sixty odd years. She wore a cap with strings, in the style of long ago: it was a rather jaunty cap and not devoid of colour. A faded shawl hung loosely around her shoulders, and a white apron protected her neat black frock. I saw at once that she was a nervous little body, yet there was dignity as well as deference in the face which looked smilingly into mine. But the manner of her address took my heart by storm. I had never been accosted in this way before, and I nearly took the old lady in my arms and kissed her. I have done since! "Yes, love!" she said. It was not an inquiry exactly, though there may have been the faintest note of interrogation in her voice. It was as though I had told her of my desire to rent the cottage, and she was expressing a gratified assent. "I see this little house is to let," I began; "may I look at it, and will you tell me all about it?" "To be sure, love," was the reply. "Now, just come inside my cottage and rest yourself, and I'll pour you out a cup of tea if you're in no hurry, for there's sure to be someone passing who will tell Reuben Goodenough to come hither." "How sweet of you!" I replied. "A cup of tea will be like the nectar of the gods. I will drink it thankfully." The inside of that room was a revelation to me. It was, oh, so very, very small--the smallest living-room I am sure that I ever set eyes upon--but so marvellously clean, and so comfortably homelike that I uttered an exclamation of surprise and delight as I crossed the threshold. The ceiling was of oak, with deep, broad, uneven beams of the same material, all dark and glossy with age. The stone floor was covered for the most part with druggeting, whilst a thick rug composed of small cuttings of black cloth with a design in scarlet was laid before the ample hearth. An old oak sideboard, or dresser, nearly filled the wall facing the window, and on its open shelves was an array of china which would make some people I know break the tenth commandment. A magnificent grandfather's clock, also in oak, with wonderful carving, ticked importantly in one corner, and a capacious cupboard filled another.