A JOURNAL KEPT IN THE COUNTRY. 2O/ 



a dishevelled prisoner, was interned beside us under 

 the Gloire-de-Dijon of the porch. I tell her I am 

 afraid they never have such good games in my 

 garden. 



" No," says Alice, combing the hair out of her 

 eyes to watch the game ; " but I think we could. You 

 see, we know all the hides there are here ; but in 

 your garden it would take oh, years to find them 

 all out. And the gardener dug up all the nut trees 

 where we used to play at jungles, and he planted a 

 lot of silly old rhubarb there instead and what games 

 can you play in rhubarb ? We did try to do the 

 jungle, but it was no good." 



" I thought the rhubarb was always rather under- 

 sized," says the Rector to Mrs. Lydia. 



" It got trodden down so," Alice explains. " Kitty 

 and Peter both wanted to be the tiger, and when 

 they both tried to hide in the same place, they 

 squashed it. I do wish we hadn't found out all the 

 hides quite so soon, though." 



A desperate charge of Bob's through the enemy 

 here rescues the captive ; and the two rush away to 

 restore the fight. The Rector moralises a little on 

 Alice's text about the hiding-places ; he thinks we 

 may presently have to regulate exploration and 

 scientific research, to leave humanity sufficient exercise 



