o runs away.
They--the boys--are at this moment (ready dressed for church) all lying
on their stomachs in various parts of the garden. I am afraid to go out
lest I should be shot. Mr. Plornish, says his prayers at night in a
whisper lest the cat should overhear him and take offence. The tradesmen
cry out as they come up the avenue: '_Me Voici_! _C'est
Moi_--_boulanger_--_me tirez pas_, _Monsieur Frenche_!' It is like
living in a state of siege, and the wonderful manner in which the cat
preserves the character of being the only person not much put out by the
intensity of this monomania is most ridiculous. The finest thing is that
immediately after I have heard the noble sportsman blazing away at her in
the garden in front I look out of my room door into the drawing-room and
am pretty sure to see her coming in after the bird, in the calmest manner
possible, by the back window." But no harm ever came to "our wonderful
little 'Dick,'" who lived to a ripe old age--sixteen years--and was
buried under a rose tree at "Gad's Hill."

On his return from his last visit to America he wrote a charming account
of his welcome home by the dogs at "Gad's Hill." "As you ask me about
the dogs, I begin with them. When I came down first I came to Gravesend,
five miles off. The two Newfoundland dogs coming to meet me with the
usual carriage and the usual driver, and beholding me coming in my usual
dress out at the usual door, it struck me that their recollection of my
having been absent for any unusual time was at once cancelled. They
behaved (they are both young dogs) exactly in their usual manner, coming
behind the basket phaeton as we trotted along and lifting their heads to
have their ears pulled, a special attention which they received from no
one else. But when I drove into the stableyard, 'Linda' was greatly
excited; weeping profusely, and throwing herself on her back that she
might caress my foot with her great forepaws. Mamie's little dog, too,
'Mrs. Bouncer,' barked in the greatest agitation on being called down and
asked: 'Who is this?' tore round me, like the dog in the Faust outlines."

My father brought with him, on his return from his first visit to
America, a small, shaggy Havana spaniel, which had been given to him and
which he had named "Timber Doodle." He wrote of him: "Little doggy
improves rapidly and now jumps over my stick at the word of command."
"Timber," travelled with us in all our foreign wanderings,