into holes, and there was one especially big
one near the window, where Esmeralda, who was nothing if not artistic,
had painted so accurate a repetition of the pattern on the boards
beneath that one could scarcely see where one ended, and the other
began!

The original intention had been to disguise the hole, but so proud was
the family of the success of the imitation, that it became one of the
show places of the establishment. When the hounds met at Bally William,
and the Major brought old Lord Atrim into the house for lunch, he called
the old gentleman's attention to it with a chuckle of enjoyment. "My
daughter's work! The second, Joan here--Esmeralda, we call her. She'll
be an artist yet! A real genius with the brush." And the old lord had
laughed till he cried, and stared at Esmeralda the whole time of lunch,
and when Christmas-time came round, did he not send her the most
beautiful box of the best possible paints, the very thing of all others
for which she had been longing, so that it seemed after all that it had
been a good thing when the terriers Tramp and Scamp had scratched the
thin web into a hole! The ceilings were black with the smoke of fire
and lamps, but the silver on the oak dresser would have delighted the
heart of a connoisseur, and the china in daily use would have been laid
out for view in glassed-in cabinets in most households, instead of being
given over to the care of an Irish biddy who tried to hang cups upon
hooks with her head turned in an opposite direction, and had a weakness
for sitting on the corner of the table to rest herself in the midst of
washing the plates.

Outside the garden was an overgrown wilderness of vegetation, for the
one gardener, realising the impossibility of doing the work of the six
who would have been required to keep the place in order, resigned
himself to doing nothing at all, or as little as was compatible with the
weekly drawing of wages. The stables were empty, save for the two fine
hunters which were necessary for the Major's enjoyment of his favourite
sport, and the rough little pony which did duty for all the rest of the
family in turns. The row of glass-houses looked imposing enough from a
distance, but almost squalid at a nearer view, for, as the Major could
not afford to keep them in working order, broken panes greeted the eye
in every direction, and plants were replaced by broken pieces of
furniture and the hutches and cages of such live-stock as w