courts, and there was a bowling-green by the house.  Then there was a large kitchen-garden, with standards and espaliers, and box-edged beds.  The stables, which were spacious, contained only a pony and the little cart I had driven up in, and a few bicycles.  I liked the solid air of the big house, which had two wings at the back, corresponding to the wings in front; the long row of stone pedimented windows, with heavy white casements, was plain and stately, and there were some fine magnolias and wisterias trained upon the walls.  It all looked stately, and yet home-like; there was nothing neglected about it, and yet it looked wholesomely left alone; everything was neat, but nothing was smart.

I was strolling about, enjoying the gleams of bright sunshine and the cold air, when I saw Father Payne coming down the garden towards me.  He gave me a pleasant nod:  I said something about the beauty of the place; he smiled, and said “Yes, it is the kind of thing I like—­but I am so used to it that I can hardly even see it!  That’s the worst of habit; but there is nothing about the place to get on your nerves.  It’s a well-bred old house, I think, and knows how to hold its tongue, without making you uncomfortable,” Then he went on presently:  “You know how I came by it?  It’s an odd story.  It had been in my family, till my grandfather left it to his second wife, and cut my father out.  There was a son by the second wife, who was meant to have it; but he died, and it went to a brother of the second wife, and his widow left it back to me.  It was an entire surprise, because I did not know her, and the only time I had ever seen the house was once when I came down on the sly, just to look at the old place, little thinking I should ever come here.  She had some superstition about it, I fancy!  Anyhow, while I was grubbing away in town, fifteen years ago, and hardly able to make two ends meet, I suddenly found myself put in possession of it; and though I am poor, as squires go, the farms and cottages bring me in quite enough to rub along.  At any rate it enabled me to try some experiments, and I have been doing so ever since.  Leisure and solitude!  Those are the only two things worth having that money can buy.  Perhaps you don’t think there’s much solitude about our life?  But solitude only means the power to think your own thoughts, without having other people’s thoughts trailed across the track.  Loneliness is quite a different thing, and that’s not wholesome.”

He strolled on, looking about him.  “Do you ever garden?” he said.  “It’s the best fun in the world—­making plants do as you like, while all the time they think they are doing as they like.  That’s the secret of it!  You can’t bully these wild things, but they are very obedient, as long as they believe they are free.  They are like children; they will take any amount of trouble as long as you don’t call it work.”