be when it's grown a bit."

"Let's go on to the shrubbery," said Mrs. Atherley. "We are having a new
grass path from here to the shrubbery. It's going to be called Henry's
Walk."

Miss Atherley has a small brother called Henry. Also there were eight
Kings of England called Henry. Many a time and oft one of those nine
Henrys has paced up and down this grassy walk, his head bent, his hands
clasped behind his back; while behind his furrowed brow, who shall say
what world-schemes were hatching? Is it the thought of Wolsey which
makes him frown--or is he wondering where he left his catapult? Ah! who
can tell us? Let us leave a veil of mystery over it ... for the sake of
the next visitor.

"The shrubbery," said Mrs. Atherley proudly, waving her hand at a couple
of laurel bushes and a--I've forgotten its name now, but it is one of
the few shrubs I really know.

"And if you're a gentleman," said Miss Atherley, "and want to get asked
here again, you'll always _call_ it the shrubbery."

"Really, I don't see what else you could call it," I said, wishing to be
asked down again.

"The patch."

"True," I said. "I mean, Nonsense."

I was rather late for breakfast next morning; a pity on such a lovely
spring day.

"I'm so sorry," I began, "but I was looking at the shrubbery from my
window and I quite forgot the time."

"Good," said Miss Atherley.

"I must thank you for putting me in such a perfect room for it," I went on,
warming to my subject. "One can actually see the shrubs--er--shrubbing. The
plantation, too, seems a little thicker to me than yesterday."

"I expect it is."

"In fact, the tennis lawn----" I looked round anxiously. I had a sudden
fear that it might be the new deer-park. "It still is the tennis lawn?"
I asked.

"Yes. Why, what about it?"

"I was only going to say the tennis lawn had quite a lot of shadows on
it. Oh, there's no doubt that the plantation is really asserting
itself."

Eleven o'clock found me strolling in the grounds with Miss Atherley.

"You know," I said, as we paced Henry's Walk together, "the one thing
the plantation wants is for a bird to nest in it. That is the hall-mark
of a plantation."

"It's mother's birthday to-morrow. Wouldn't it be a lovely surprise for
her?"

"It would, indeed. Unfortunately this is a matter in which you require
the co-operation of a feathered friend."

"Couldn't you try to persuade a bird to build a nest in the weeping ash?
Just for this once?