circle melting into another, the timbered acres of the park. "The very beasts have made him welcome," I said, as we rejoined our companion.
"The peacock has done for you, Mr. Searle," said his cousin, "what he does only for very great people. A year ago there came here a duchess to see my brother. I don't think that since then he has spread his tail as wide for any one else by a dozen feathers."
"It's not alone the peacock," said Searle. "Just now there came slipping across my path a little green lizard, the first I ever saw, the lizard of literature! And if you have a ghost, broad daylight though it be, I expect to see him here. Do you know the annals of your house, Miss Searle?"
"O dear, no! You must ask my brother for all those things."
"You ought to have a book full of legends and traditions. You ought to have loves and murders and mysteries by the roomful. I count upon it."
"Mr. Searle! We have always been a very well-behaved family. Nothing out of the way has ever happened, I think."
"Nothing out of the way? horrors! We have done better than that in America. Why, I myself!"—and he gazed at her a moment with a gleam of malice, and then broke into a laugh. "Suppose I should turn out a better Searle than you? Better than you, nursed
