forget-me-nots. The birds--don't ask me what kind; they all look
alike to me, unless they have a hall mark of some bright color--
the birds were chirping in the hedges, and everything breathed of
peace. Liddy, who was born and bred on a brick pavement, got a
little bit down-spirited when the crickets began to chirp, or
scrape their legs together, or whatever it is they do, at
twilight.

The first night passed quietly enough. I have always been
grateful for that one night's peace; it shows what the country
might be, under favorable circumstances. Never after that night
did I put my head on my pillow with any assurance how long it
would be there; or on my shoulders, for that matter.

On the following morning Liddy and Mrs. Ralston, my own
housekeeper, had a difference of opinion, and Mrs. Ralston left
on the eleven train. Just after luncheon, Burke, the butler, was
taken unexpectedly with a pain in his right side, much worse when
I was within hearing distance, and by afternoon he was started
cityward. That night the cook's sister had a baby--the cook,
seeing indecision in my face, made it twins on second thought--
and, to be short, by noon the next day the household staff was
down to Liddy and myself. And this in a house with twenty-two
rooms and five baths!

Liddy wanted to go back to the city at once, but the milk-boy
said that Thomas Johnson, the Armstrongs' colored butler, was
working as a waiter at the Greenwood Club, and might come back.
I have the usual scruples about coercing people's servants away,
but few of us have any conscience regarding institutions or