o stuff them in my pockets and take them home
for proper burial?"

"You know in spite of all the Labour Governments and strange doings in
Parliament, there are still pretty strict laws against poaching."

"Poaching, guvner? I wouldnt poach. I respect what's yours, just as I
respect what's my own. Trespassing maybe. I likes to look at a little
bit of sky or hear a meadowlark or smell a flower or two, but
poaching--! Really, guvner, you hadnt ought to take away a man's
character."

I thought it a shame so sturdy and amusing a fellow should have to eke
out his living so precariously. "I'll tell you what I'll do," I said.
"I'll give you a note right now to my head gamekeeper and have him put
you on as an assistant. Thirty shillings a week I think it pays."

"Well, now, thank you, guvner, but really, I don't want it. Thirty bob a
week! What should I do with it? Nothing but go down to the Holly Tree
and get drunk every night. I'm much better off as I am--total
abstinence, in a manner of speaking. No, no, guvner, I appreciate your
big heart, but I'm happy with my little bit of fish and a rabbit in the
pot--why should I set up to be an honest workingman and get dissatisfied
with my life?"

His refusal of my wellintentioned offer did not irk me. In a large and
tolerant view you could almost say we were both parasites upon The Ivies
and it would not hurt me if he stole a little of my game to keep himself
alive. I gave him a note to protect him against any of the keepers who
might come upon him as I had, and we parted with mutual liking; I
remembering for my part that I was an American and all men, poacher and
landlord alike, were created equal, no matter how far each had come from
his beginnings.

_80._ Shortly after, Miss Francis ended her long sojourn at Mount
Whitney and returned to England. The ordeal of living surrounded by the
Grass, which had destroyed her assistants, seemed to have made no other
change in her than the fading of her hair, which was now completely
white, and a loss of weight, giving her a deceptive appearance of
fragility at variance with the forthrightness of her manner.

I put down her immunity to agoraphobia as just another evidence that she
was already mad. Her refusal to accept the limitations of her sex and
her complete indifference to our respective stations were mere
confirmations. With her usual disregard of realities she assumed I would
go on financing her indefinitely in spite of the hu