s if they
were miles away already in the heart of the country; so that, accustomed
as they had been only to town life, it may be imagined how great the
change was to them in every way.

As for runaway Dick from Guildford, who had been familiarised to rustic
scenes from his earliest infancy, he could see no beauty in the various
objects that each instant delighted the little Londoners' eyes and ears;
for, like the hero of Wordsworth's verse, "the primrose by the river's
brim" was but a primrose and nothing more to him!

To Bob and Nellie, however, the scene around, with its salient features,
disclosed a new world.

There were great, nodding, ox-eyed daisies that popped up pertly on
either side, staring at them from amidst wastes of wild hyacinths and
forget-me-nots that were bluer than Nellie's witching eyes.

Pink and white convolvulus hung in festoons across the bracken-bordered
little winding pathways that led here and there through mazes of
shrubbery and undergrowth, under the arched wilderness of greenery
above.

Rippling rivulets trickling down from nowhere and wandering whither
their erratic wills directed, their soft, murmuring voices chiming in
with the gayer carols of the birds.

Amongst these could be distinguished the harmonious notes of some not
altogether unknown to them, the trill of the lark on high, the whistle
of the blackbird in the hidden covert, the "pretty Dick" of the thrush,
and the "chink, chink!" of the robin and coo of the dove, mingled with
the sweet but subdued song of the yellow-hammer and sharp staccato
accompaniment of the untiring chaffinch; while, all the time, a colony
of asthmatic old rooks in the taller trees of the park cawed their part
in the concert in a deep bass key at regular intervals, "Caw, caw, caw!"

Bob and Nellie were so delighted and unsparing of their admiration of
everything they saw and heard, that Dick fell to wondering at the
pleasure they took in things which he held of little account.

If unappreciative, however, Dick was of some service in telling Nellie
the names of the principal wild-flowers; while he rose high in Bob's
estimation by his lore in the matter of birds' nests, of which the ex-
runaway from the country, naturally, could speak as an expert.

Touching the feathered tribe generally, he was able to tell them off at
a glance, with the habits and characteristics of each, as readily as Bob
could repeat the Multiplication Table--more so, indeed, if