is to say, we accidentally dropped the aspidistra out of the window,
lost the chiffonier, removed most of the obstacles and entanglements
from the drawing-room to the box-room, and replaced the lace curtains
with chintzes. In the same spirit of altruism we improved the
bedrooms. At the end of a week we had given Mr. Perkins a cottage of
which any man might be proud.

But there is no pleasing some people. A closer examination of the
lease, in the hope that we had over-counted the noughts in the rental,
revealed to us the following:--

"At the expiration of the said tenancy, all furniture and effects will
be delivered up by the tenant in the same rooms and positions in which
they were found."

Not a word of thanks, you notice, for the new avenues of beauty which
we had opened out for him; no gratitude for the great revelation that
art was not bounded by aspidistras nor comfort by chiffoniers; nothing
but that old reactionary spirit to which, if I may speak of lesser
things, the Russian Revolution was due. Like Mr. Perkins, the Bourbons
learned nothing and forgot nothing.

Naturally I wrote to Mr. Perkins:--

"Dear Sir,--I regret to inform you that the aspidistra has
perished. It never took kindly to us and started wilting on
the second day. As regards other _objets d'art_ once in the
drawing-room, but now seeking the seclusion of the box-room,
we are in a little difficulty. Before letting it go my
wife took the bearing of the marble how-now from the bamboo