ely those late hybrids were! Why, the way that Margaret Dickson
drooped her head above the pansies, still blooming freely at her feet,
was enough to melt the heart of a Salem gibraltar! A pity that the
professor's attention seemed for the moment to be riveted upon the toe
of his boot!

"I wish you would say something more," Olivia repeated.

"Something different, you mean," and Doctor Page smiled, benignly and
stubbornly.

"For instance, you might tell me why you are opposed to it."

"You wouldn't understand."

"I might; you said, only the other day, that I sometimes displayed
almost human intelligence!"

The professor liked to have his jokes remembered; but still he seemed
inclined to temporise.

"I might say that we couldn't afford it. It is generally conceded that
Alma Mater is not a munificent provider."

"Yes; and you might say that my great-grandfather was not an East
India trader--only you don't tell fibs."

"Or that a sun-dial is an anachronism."

"You are too good a Latin scholar for that."

"So a subterfuge won't do? Very well; then you'll have to put up with
a psychological proposition."

"How interesting!"

The professor glanced at the expectant young face turned toward him,
and he could not but admit that his estimate of its owner's
intelligence had been well within the truth.

"You think a sun-dial would make it the prettiest garden in
Dunbridge?"

"I'm sure it would."

"And that is what you are aiming at?"

"Yes."

"Now, I have noticed that when you have got what you are aiming at you
lose interest in it."

"O Papa!"

"There was tennis," he went on, marking off the list on a combative
forefinger, "and cookery; there was the Polyglot Club, and the
Sketching Club, and----"

"But, Papa! They were every one of them good things, and I got a lot
out of them; truly, I did."

"No doubt; but as soon as you could play tennis, or sketch a pine
tree, or toss an omelette a little better than the other girls, you
had squeezed your orange dry."

"But, Papa! I've stuck to gardening for more than two years!" Olivia's
tone seemed to give those years the dignity of centuries.

"True; but you haven't got your sun-dial. You will consider that the
finishing touch, and then before we know it you will be wanting to
turn the whole thing into a sand-garden for the little micks at the
Corners."

"Not such a bad idea," Olivia admitted unguardedly.

"There you are! The mere mention of a new schem