to answer, when I came back from a journey to Brisbane--for a man
naturally finds it hard to lay bare how he spent all his time in town.
Because he did it so suavely and naively, one could not be resentful. It
might seem that matters had reached a climax, when, one day, Mulholland
came over, and, seeing my wife and her lovers together watering the
garden and teaching cockatoos, said to me that Billy had the advantage of
me on my own ground. It may not be to my credit that I only grinned, and
forbore even looking foolish. Yet I was very fond of my wife all the
time. We stood pretty high on the Charwon Downs, and though it was
terribly hot at times, it was healthy enough; and she never lost her
prettiness, though, maybe, she lacked bloom.

I think I never saw her look better than she did that day when Mulholland
was with me. She had on the lightest, softest kind of stuff, with
sleeves reaching only a little below her elbow--her hands and arms never
got sunburnt in the hottest weather--her face smiled out from under the
coolest-looking hat imaginable, and her hair, though gathered, had a
happy trick of always lying very loose and free about the head, saving
her from any primness otherwise possible, she was so neat. Mulholland
and I were sitting in the veranda. I glanced up at the thermometer, and
it registered a hundred in the shade! Mechanically I pushed the lime-
juice towards Mulholland, and pointed to the water-bag. There was
nothing else to do except grumble at the drought. Yet there my wife was,
a picture of coolness and delight; the intense heat seemed only to make
her the more refreshing to the eye. Water was not abundant, but we still
felt justified in trying to keep her bushes and flowers alive; and she
stood there holding the hose and throwing the water in the cheerfulest
shower upon the beds. Billy stood with his hands on his hips watching
her, very hot, very self-contained. He was shining with perspiration;
and he looked the better of it. Eversofar was camped beneath a sandal-