The gardens at Wrayth were famous. The natural beauty of their position
and the endless care of generations of loving mistresses had left them a
monument of what nature can be trained into by human skill. They had
also in the eighteenth century by some happy chance escaped the hand of
Capability Brown. And instead of pulling about and altering the taste of
the predecessor the successive owners had used fresh ground for their
fancies. Thus the English rose-garden and the Dutch-clipped yews of
William-and-Mary's time were as intact as the Italian parterre.

But November is not the time to judge of gardens, and Tristram wished
the sun would come out. He waited for his bride at the foot of the Adam
staircase, and, at eleven, she came down. He watched her as she put one
slender foot before the other in her descent, he had not noticed before
how ridiculously inadequate they were--just little bits of baby feet,
even in her thick walking-boots. She certainly knew how to dress--and
adapt herself to the customs of a country. Her short, serge frock and
astrakhan coat and cap were just the things for the occasion; and she
looked so attractive and chic, with her hands in her monster muff, he
began to have that pain again of longing for her, so he said icily:

"The sky is gray and horrid. You must not judge of things as you will
see them to-day; it is all really rather nice in the summer."

"I am sure it is," she answered meekly, and then could not think of
anything else to say, so they walked on in silence through the courtyard
and round under a deep, arched doorway in the Norman wall to the
southern side of the Adam erection, with its pillars making the
centerpiece. The beautiful garden stretched in front of them. This
particular part was said to have been laid out from plans of Le Notre,