cares and affection.' And I went on to deliver such a diatribe while
comparing botany and the world, that we ended miles away from the
dividing wall, and the Countess must have supposed me to be a wretched
and wounded sufferer worthy of her pity. However, at the end of half
an hour my neighbor naturally brought me back to the point; for women,
when they are not in love, have all the cold blood of an experienced
attorney.

"'If you insist on my leaving the paling,' said I, 'you will learn
all the secrets of gardening that I want to hide; I am seeking to grow
a blue dahlia, a blue rose; I am crazy for blue flowers. Is not blue
the favorite color of superior souls? We are neither of us really at
home; we might as well make a little door of open railings to unite
our gardens. . . . You, too, are fond of flowers; you will see mine, I
shall see yours. If you receive no visitors at all, I, for my part,
have none but my uncle, the Cure of the White Friars.'

"'No,' said she, 'I will give you the right to come into my garden,
my premises at any hour. Come and welcome; you will always be admitted
as a neighbor with whom I hope to keep on good terms. But I like my
solitude too well to burden it with any loss of independence.'

"'As you please,' said I, and with one leap I was over the paling.

"'Now, of what use would a door be?' said I, from my own domain,
turning round to the Countess, and mocking her with a madman's gesture
and grimace.

"For a fortnight I seemed to take no heed of my neighbor. Towards the
end of May, one lovely evening, we happened both to be out on opposite