unadorned nature." If these was not exactly her words, they express the
ideas she roused in my mind. She said the place was far enough away
from railways and the stream of travel, and among the simple peasantry,
and that in the society of the resident gentry we would see English
country life as it is, uncontaminated by the tourist or the commercial
traveller.

I can't remember all the things she said about this charming cottage in
this most supremely beautiful spot, but I sat and listened, and the
description held me spell-bound, as a snake fascinates a frog; with
this difference, instead of being swallowed by the description, I
swallowed it.

When the old woman had given us the address of the person who had the
letting of the cottage, and Jone and me had gone to our room, I said to
him, before we had time to sit down:

"What do you think?"

"I think," said he, "that we ought to follow that old woman's advice
and go and look at this house."

"Go and look at it?" I exclaimed. "Not a bit of it. If we do that, we
are bound to see something or hear something that will make us hesitate
and consider, and if we do that, away goes our enthusiasm and our
rapture. I say, telegraph this minute and say we'll take the house, and
send a letter by the next mail with a postal order in it, to secure the
place."

Jone looked at me hard, and said he'd feel easier in his mind if he