“No,” I said, “you will have to do it for yourself.  For such an eye as yours even the best oculists are unavailing.”

“I might,” she said, “improve if I read poetry at home.  Has any poet written about sunflowers?”

“Yes,” I said, “BLAKE did.  He was quite mad, and he wrote a poem to a sunflower:  ‘Ah!  Sunflower!  Weary of time.’  That’s how it begins.”

“Weary of time!” she said scornfully.  “That’s no good to me.  I’m weary of having no time at all to myself.”

“That shows,” I said, “that you’re not a sunflower.”

“Thank heaven for that,” she said.  “It’s enough to have four children to look after—­five including yourself.”

“My dear Francesca,” I said, “how charming you are to count me as a child!  I shall really begin to feel as if there were golden threads among the silver.”

“Tut-tut,” she said, “you’re not so grey as all that.”

“Yes, I am,” I said, “quite as grey as all that and much greyer; only we don’t talk about it.”

“But we do talk about sunflowers,” she said, “don’t we?”

“If you’ll promise to have the beastly glaring things dug up—­”

“Not,” she said, “before we’ve extracted from them their last pip of chicken-food.”

“Well, anyhow,” I said, “as soon as possible.  If you’ll promise to do that I’ll promise never to mention them again.”

“But you’ll lose your reputation with the Generals and Colonels.”

“I don’t mind that,” I said, “if I can only rid the garden of their detested presence.”

“My golden-threaded boy,” said Francesca, “it shall be as you desire.”

R.C.L.

* * * * *

CONSTABLE JINKS.

  Our village policeman is tall and well-grown,
  He stands six feet two and he weighs sixteen stone;
  His gait is majestic, his visage serene,
  And his boots are the biggest that ever I’ve seen.

  Fame sealed his renown with a definite stamp
  When two German waiters escaped from a camp. 
  Unaided he captured those runaway Huns
  Who had lived for a week on three half-penny buns.

  When a derelict porpoise was cast on the shore
  Our village policeman was much to the fore;
  He measured the beast from its tip to its tail,
  And blandly pronounced it “an undersized whale.”

  When a small boy was flying his kite on the links
  It was promptly impounded by Constable Jinks,
  Who astutely remarked that it might have been seen
  By the vigilant crew of a Hun submarine.

  It is sometimes alleged that great valour he showed
  When he chased a mad cow for three miles on the road;
  But there’s also another account of the hunt
  With a four-legged pursuer, a biped in front.

  If your house has been robbed and his counsel you seek
  He’s sure to look in—­in the course of the week,
  When his massive appearance will comfort your cook,
  Though he fails in the bringing of culprits to book.