1 84 IDLEHURST: 



came with Mrs. Lydia to paint in the garden ; and 

 when I came home from a visit to the village, I 

 found the girls hard at work among the roses, and 

 the duenna just assuming command of the tea-table. 

 Margaret, with a last frown at her work, slammed 

 her colour-box together, and came towards us ; Helen, 

 head aslant and brush in mouth, stayed to work 

 out the happy moment on a study perhaps as suc- 

 cessful as a young lady's is ever likely to be. The 

 garden was at the height of its summer pomp, hiding 

 its bounds with walls of peas and pyramids of con- 

 volvulus, rose trellises, towers of hollyhock and banks 

 of phlox ; and by such restriction of view giving scope 

 for all manner of magic vistas and imaginary dis- 

 tances, a condition that has a parallel, perhaps, in 

 some states of the soul. Helen had got into her 

 canvas something of the glow, glitter, and stir of a 

 world of flowers, beneath a square of blue sky as 

 dark as a July afternoon can show. 



At tea she told us how she had been to see old 

 Mrs. Heasman, as she wanted to make a study of 

 her thousand wrinkles and tremendous nose. After 

 sufficient explanations, as Helen judged, she had 

 said to the old lady, " Then you are quite sure you 

 don't mind coming and giving me a sitting ? " and 

 had received the rather mysterious reply, " Well, 



