e--I lost two ferrets there, this time
two years, and one of them was found t'other side of the canal; it must
have been a pleasant place in those days, when the king was making his
private road through the Chelsea fields, and the stream was as clear as
a thrush's eye, and birds of all sorts were so tamed by Madame Ellen,
that they'd come when she'd call them. Ah, a pretty woman might catch a
king, but it's only a kind one that could tame the wild birds of the
air; I know that; I'll show you the way with pleasure." "Poor Tom," sung
out the starling. "Your bird is calling you," we observed, after he had
told his wife not to let the jay pick "the splints" off his broken leg,
and we were leaving the door. "It's not me he's calling," answered the
old man, with a heavy sigh. "Now that's a bit of nature, ma'am. A bird,
I'm thinking, remembers longer than a Christian does. Poor Tom's wife is
married again, but the starling still calls for its master. It's hard to
say, what they do or do not know; the bird often wrings my heart; but
for all that, I could not part with him." At any other time we would
have asked him the reason, but just then we were thinking more of Nell
Gwynne than of our guide. We walked on, until we came to the "World's
End." "It is nothing but a common public-house now," observed our
companion, who had not spoken again, except to his dog: "but I remember
when it was more than that; and, moreover, in Nell's time, it was a
place of great resort for noblemen and fine ladies--a royal tea-garden,
they say--filled with the best of good company; they liked the country
and the open air in those days." We continued silent, until at last our
guide called "Stop!" so suddenly, as to make us start. "Do you see that
bank just under the arch of the bridge we stand on? The hardest day's
work I ever had was digging an old rat out of that bank. This is Sandy
End; and that house opposite is Sandford Manor House[F]."

There was nothing in the sight of those green, grim walls to excite any
feeling of romance. Yet positively our heart beat more rapidly than
usual for a minute or two--"a way it has" when we are at all interested.
We turned down a lane seamed with ruts, by the side of a paling black
with gas tar. We passed two or three exceedingly old houses, and one in
particular with three windows in front. It was evident that the paling
had been run across the garden, which must have been very extensive.
After waiting a few minut