than in any park in England.
Besides--"

"Besides," said she, "you want to get on to your dearly-loved upper
Thames, and show your prowess down the heavy swathes of the mowing
grass."

She looked at him fondly, and I could tell that she was seeing him in her
mind's eye showing his splendid form at its best amidst the rhymed
strokes of the scythes; and she looked down at her own pretty feet with a
half sigh, as though she were contrasting her slight woman's beauty with
his man's beauty; as women will when they are really in love, and are not
spoiled with conventional sentiment.

As for Dick, he looked at her admiringly a while, and then said at last:
"Well, Clara, I do wish we were there! But, hilloa! we are getting back
way." And he set to work sculling again, and in two minutes we were all
standing on the gravelly strand below the bridge, which, as you may
imagine, was no longer the old hideous iron abortion, but a handsome
piece of very solid oak framing.

We went into the Court and straight into the great hall, so well
remembered, where there were tables spread for dinner, and everything
arranged much as in Hammersmith Guest-Hall. Dinner over, we sauntered
through the ancient rooms, where the pictures and tapestry were still
preserved, and nothing was much changed, except that the people whom we
met there had an indefinable kind of look of being at home and at ease,
which communicated itself to me, so that I felt that the beautiful old
place was mine in the best sense of the word; and my pleasure of past
days seemed to add itself to that of to-day, and filled my whole soul
with content.

Dick (who, in spite of Clara's gibe, knew the place very well) told me
that the beautiful old Tudor rooms, which I remembered had been the
dwellings of the lesser fry of Court flunkies, were now much used by
people coming and going; for, beautiful as architecture had now become,
and although the whole face of the country had quite recovered its
beauty, there was still a sort of tradition of pleasure and beauty which
clung to that group of buildings, and people thought going to Hampton
Court a necessary summer outing, as they did in the days when London was
so grimy and miserable. We went into some of the rooms looking into the
old garden, and were well received by the people in them, who got
speedily into talk with us, and looked with politely half-concealed
wonder at my strange face. Besides these birds of passage, and a