ee trunks in the
woods, and the only black spots are the dark downs in the distance, with
the sky pale gold behind them.

You would love motoring, not only for what you do see, but for what you
nearly see, and long to see, but can't--just as Dad used to say "Thank
God for all the blessings I've never had!" Why, every road you don't go
down looks fantastically alluring, just twice as alluring as the one you
are in. You grudge missing anything, and fear, greedily, that there may
be better villages with more history beyond the line of your route. It's
no consolation when Mrs. Norton says, "Well, you can't see everything!"
You _want_ to see everything. And you wish you had eyes all the way
round your head. It would be inconvenient for hair and hats, but you
could manage somehow.

We had to go through Petworth, a most feudal-looking old place, reeking
of history since the Confessor, and mentioned in the Domesday Book (I do
so respect towns or houses mentioned in the Domesday Book!), and if it
had been the right day we could have seen Lord Leconsfield's collection
of pictures, some of the best in England; but it was the wrong day, so
we sailed on out of Surrey into Sussex, and arrived at Bignor.

All I knew about Bignor was that I must expect something amazing there.
Sir Lionel asked me not to read about it in the books of which we have a
travelling library in the car--one at least for each county we shall
visit. He said he "wanted Bignor to be a surprise" for me; and it is odd
the way one finds oneself obeying that man! Not that one's afraid of
him, but--well, I don't know why exactly, but one just does it. We
didn't stop in the village, though there was the quaintest grocery shop
there you can imagine, perfectly mediaeval; and in the churchyard yew
trees grand enough to make bows for half the archers of England--if
there were any in these days. We went on to quite a modern-looking
farmhouse, and Sir Lionel said, "I am going to ask Mrs. Tupper if she
will give us a little lunch. If she says 'yes,' it's sure to be good."

"I don't know any Tuppers, Lionel," objected Mrs. Norton. "Who are
they?"

"Relatives of Martin Tupper, if that name recalls anything to your
mind," said he.

Mrs. Norton had a vague idea that she had been more or less brought up
on extracts from Martin Tupper, and seemed to associate him with
Sundays, when, as a child, she hadn't been allowed to play. But that
didn't explain how Lionel happened to kn