see you trying to climb a tree--that is, if I were safe up one
myself!"

The arrival of the ponies cut short the discussion. Daleham swung his
sister up into the saddle of her smart little countrybred and mounted his
own waler.

Out along the road through the estate they trotted in the cool northerly
breeze that swept down from the mountains and tempered the sun's heat. The
panorama of the Himalayas was glorious, although Kinchinjunga had now drawn
up his covering of clouds over his face and the Snows had disappeared. The
long orderly lines of tea-bushes were dotted here and there with splashes
of colour from the bright-hued _puggris_, or turbans, of the men and the
_saris_ and petticoats of the female coolies, who were busy among the
plants, pruning them or tending their wounds after the storm.

The brother and sister quickened their pace and, racing along the soft
earthern road, soon reached the patch of forest that intervened between the
garden and the nursery.

"I say, Noreen, I think we'd better go the long way round," said Daleham
apprehensively, as he pulled up his waler.

"Oh, no, Fred. Don't funk it. Do come on," urged the girl. "If you don't,
I'll go on by myself and meet you at the nursery."

The dispute was a daily occurrence and always ended in the man weakly
giving in.

"That's a dear boy," said his sister consolingly, when she had gained her
point.

"Yes, that's all very well," grumbled the brother. "You've got your own
way, as usual. I hope you won't have cause to regret it one day."

"Don't be silly, dear. Come on!" she replied, touching her pony with the
whip. The animal seemed to dislike entering the forest as much as the man
did. "Oh, do go on, Kitty. Don't be tiresome."

The pony balked, but finally gave way under protest, and they rode on into
the jungle. A bridle path wound through the undergrowth and between the
trees, and this they followed.

It was easy to understand the girl's enthusiasm and desire to be in the
forest. After the tameness of the tea-garden the wild beauty of the giant
trees, their huge limbs clothed in the green leaves and drooping trails of
blossoms of the orchids, the tangled pattern of the interlaced creepers,
the flower-decked bushes and the high ferns, looked all the lovelier in
their untrammelled profusion.

The nursery was visited and the damage done to the young plants inspected.
Then they turned their ponies' heads towards home and went back through the