I put it on the grass just in front of his study window, where he'd
be SURE to notice it. Bless you, there's always SOMETHING to do in
this house. One is never idle."

And even when there is nothing doing, he is still happy; waiting
cheerfully upon events until they arrange themselves for his
amusement. He will sit for twenty minutes opposite the garden bank,
watching for a bumble-bee to come out of its hole. "I saw him go
in," he says to himself, "so he's bound to come out. Extraordinarily
interesting world." But to his inferiors (such as the gardener) he
pretends that it is not pleasure but duty which keeps him. "Don't
talk to me, fool. Can't you see that I've got a job on here?"

Chum has found, however, that his particular mission in life is to
purge his master's garden of all birds. This keeps him busy. As soon
as he sees a blackbird on the lawn he is in full cry after it. When
he gets to the place and finds the blackbird gone, he pretends that
he was going there anyhow; he gallops round in circles, rolls over
once or twice, and then trots back again. "You didn't REALLY think I
was such a fool as to try to catch a BLACKBIRD?" he says to us. "No,
I was just taking a little run--splendid thing for the figure."

And it is just Chum's little runs over the beds which call aloud for
firmness--which, in fact, have inspired my birthday present to him.
But there is this difficulty to overcome first. When he came to live
with us an arrangement was entered into (so he says) by which one
bed was given to him as his own. In that bed he could wander at
will, burying bones and biscuits, hunting birds. This may have been
so, but it is a pity that nobody but Chum knows definitely which is
the bed.