and down the walks looking like that
picture of her we saw when you and I were in London with Mother about
our teeth, and went to see the Loan Collection of Old Masters. I
wonder if the Dwarf picked the flowers for her. I do wonder what
Apothecary John Parkinson looked like when he offered his Speaking
Garden into her Highness's hands. And what beautiful hands she had! Do
you remember the picture, Mary? It was by Vandyck."

I remembered it quite well.

That afternoon the others could not amuse themselves, and wanted me to
tell them a story. They do not like old stories too often, and it is
rather difficult to invent new ones. Sometimes we do it by turns. We
sit in a circle and one of us begins, and the next must add something,
and so we go on. But that way does not make a good plot. My head was
so full of the Book of Paradise that afternoon that I could not think
of a story, but I said I would begin one. So I began:

"Once upon a time there was a Queen--"

"How was she dressed?" asked Adela, who thinks a good deal about
dress.

"She had a beautiful dark-blue satin robe."

"_Princesse_ shape?" inquired Adela.

"No; Queen's shape," said Arthur. "Drive on, Mary."

"And lace ruffles falling back from her Highness's hands--"

"Sweet!" murmured Adela.

"And a high hat, with plumes, on her head, and--"

"A very low dwarf at her heels," added Arthur.

"Was there really a dwarf, Mary?" asked Harry.

"There was," said I.

"Had he a hump, or was he only a plain dwarf?"

"He was a very plain dwarf," said Arthur.

"Does Arthur know the story, Mary?"

"No, Harry, he doesn't; and he oughtn't to interfere till I come to a
stop."

"Beg pardon, Mary. Drive on."

"The Queen was very much delighted with all fair flowers, and she had
a garden so full of them that it was called the Earthly Paradise."

There was a long-drawn and general "Oh!" of admiration.

"But though she was a Queen, she couldn't have flowers in the winter,
not even in an Earthly Paradise."

"Don't you suppose she had a greenhouse, by the bye, Mary?" said
Arthur.

"Oh, Arthur," cried Harry, "I do wish you'd be quiet: when you know
it's a fairy story, and that Queens of that sort never had
greenhouses or anything like we have now."

"And so the King's Apothecary and Herbarist, whose name was John
Parkinson--"

"I shouldn't have thought he would have had a common name like that,"
said Harry.

"Bessy's name is Parkinson," said Adela.

"We