A TOUR ROUND MY GARDEN. 



In the morning, when Varai informed him that breakfast was ready, Edmond cooly 

 replied, "he could not get up so early as that;" breakfast was put off an hour. When 

 he came down, I asked him if he had heard his dog? 



"Oh! yes," said he; "poor Phanor ! it's only because he does not know the house; he 

 will behave better in two or three days. Tell mc, now, blackey, what you have given 

 him to eat?" 



"I got him some dog biscuit of a neighbor." 



"Oh, that will never do ; he must have some soup, and that made thick, mind. 

 Poor Phanor! he is not accustomed to dog biscuit — "that's all very well for nif"-er 

 dogs." 



We went into the garden ; Varai brought us pipes. He condescended to take 

 notice of a large cherry-tree pipe with its amber mouthpiece, of the size of an egg, 

 and said, "Ay ! I have one with a mouthpiece twice as large as that. Thy garden 

 is pretty, Stephen ; it is not large, but it is pretty. Well, well, well, and so thou 

 amuseth thyself thus, eh ? in cultivating flowers in this way, eh ? Poor fellow ! I have 

 an uncle, now, just in the same way ; he has a handsome garden, water and woods ; I 

 must bring Master Phanor into order before we go there ; my uncle would not laugh if he 

 played the same game in his garden that he played on his arrival here last night." 



Whilst saying this he plucked a rose and put it into his button-hole. 



" What are you about there ?" 



" What am I about? why, I have gathered a middling sort of rose to wear in my but- 

 ton-hole." 



"A middling rose! it is the last that tree will bear this year, the most beautiful of 

 white roses, Madame Hardy. I hoped to see that for five or six days longer ; I shall not 

 see another for a year to come." 



" Why, thou art worse than my uncle ! Don't gather thy roses ! Well, I won't touch 

 another. What dost thou do here ? How can we amuse ourselves ?" 



" We do not amuse ourselves here." 



" Ah ! well, never mind ; I can read, I can walk. I suppose thou dost not keep thy 

 horse ?" 



" No." 



" That's a pity." 



Such is my present melancholy condition, my dear friend — when it will be over I can- 

 not tell. I seek every justifiable means of getting rid of this intruder, but he does not 

 even tell me %chen he means to go. 



Two shots in the garden caused me to hasten to see what is going on. 



Nothing less than my friend Edmond practising in the garden, and who just killed a 

 beautiful blackbird. This blackbird was, when alive, the leader of my band : I felt 

 more sorrow than I will venture to tell you when I saw him lying on the ground, with 

 his glossy black feathers stained with blood. All the cares I had taken for several jears 

 that the birds should find in my garden a sure and tranquil asylum were rendered abor- 

 tive by this firing of the gun, — the more so from its appearing a kind of perfidy, a 

 meditated murder. In every part of the neighborhood, the trees are cut down, birds are 

 taken in snares and traps, or shot with guns. Here alone I have preserved large trees 

 and thick bushes; here I have multiplied service and holly-trees with their coral berries, 

 hawthorns with their garnet fruit, elders and privets, which bear umbels of black berries, 

 the burning-bush with spikes of fire-coloured berries, ivies whose fruits become black 

 frost, laurustincs with dark-blue fruits, azerolias or small medlars covered with 

 ed apples, — in order that they might find food in abundance during the whole win 



VOL. 5. H 2. 



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