n estate; become, so to speak, `monarch of all he surveys.' O
Molly, Molly, if you was only here, wot a paradise it would be! Eden
over again; Adam an' Eve, without a'most no difference, barrin' the
clo'se, by the way, for if I ain't mistaken, Adam didn't wear a straw
hat and a blue jacket, with pumps and canvas ducks. Leastwise, I've
never heard that he did; an' I'm quite sure that Eve didn't go to church
on Sundays in a gown wi' sleeves like two legs o' mutton, an' a bonnet
like a coal-scuttle. By the way, I don't think they owned a doggie
neither."

------------------------------------------------------------------------

At this point the terrier, who had gradually quieted down during the
above soliloquy, gave a responsive wag of its tail, and looked up with a
smile--a plain, obvious, unquestionable smile, which its master believed
in most thoroughly.

"Ah, you needn't grin like that, Cuff," replied Jarwin, "it's quite
certain that Adam and Eve had no doggie. No doubt they had plenty of
wild 'uns--them as they giv'd names to--but they hadn't a good little
tame 'un like you, Cuff; no, nor nobody else, for you're the best dog in
the world--if you'd only keep yer spanker-boom quiet; but you'll shake
it off, you will, if you go on like that. There, lie down, an' let's
get on with our consultation. Well, as I was sayin' when you
interrupted me, wot a happy life we could live here if we'd only got the
old girl with us! I'd be king, you know, Cuff, and she'd be queen, and
we'd make you prime minister--you're prime favourite already, you know.
There now, if you don't clap a stopper on that ere spanker-boom, I'll
have to lash it down. Well, to proceed: we'd build a hut--or a palace--
of turf an' sticks, with a bunk alongside for you; an w'en our clo'se
began for to wear out, we'd make pants and jackets and petticoats of
cocoanut-fibre; for you must know I've often see'd mats made o' that
stuff, an' splendid wear there's in it too, though it would be rather
rough for the skin at first; but we'd get used to that in coorse o'
time. Only fancy Mrs Jarwin in a cocoanut-fibre petticoat with a
palm-leaf hat, or somethink o' that sort! An', after all, it wouldn't
be half so rediklous as some o' the canvas she's used to spread on
Sundays."

Jarwin evidently thought his ideas somewhat ridiculous, for he paused at
this point and chuckled, while Cuffy sprang up and barked responsively.

While they were thus engaged, a gl