nowadays,--large tangled hedgerows, which, though they constitute one of
the beauties most picturesque in old England, make sad deductions from
produce; great trees, overshadowing the corn and harbouring the birds;
little patches of rough sward left to waste; and angles of woodland
running into fields, exposing them to rabbits and blocking out the sun.
These and such like blots on a gentleman-farmer's agriculture, common-
sense and Giacomo had made clear to the acute comprehension of Leonard.
No such faults were perceptible in Richard Avenel's domain. The fields
lay in broad divisions, the hedges were clipped and narrowed into their
proper destination of mere boundaries. Not a blade of wheat withered
under the cold shade of a tree; not a yard of land lay waste; not a weed
was to be seen, not a thistle to waft its baleful seed through the air:
some young plantations were placed, not where the artist would put them,
but just where the farmer wanted a fence from the wind. Was there no
beauty in this? Yes, there was beauty of its kind,--beauty at once
recognizable to the initiated, beauty of use and profit, beauty that
could bear a monstrous high rent. And Leonard uttered a cry of
admiration which thrilled through the heart of Richard Avenel.

"This IS farming!" said the villager.

"Well, I guess it is," answered Richard, all his ill-humour vanishing.
"You should have seen the land when I bought it. But we new men, as they
call us (damn their impertinence!) are the new blood of this country."

Richard Avenel never said anything more true. Long may the new blood
circulate through the veins of the mighty giantess; but let the grand
heart be the same as it has beat for proud ages.

The chaise now passed through a pretty shrubbery, and the house came into