Two featherless beings appeared, uninvited, at the door of the summer-house, surveyed the constitutional creepers, and said, “These must come down”—­looked around at the horrid light of noonday, and said, “That must come in”—­went away, thereupon, and were heard, in the distance, agreeing together, “To-morrow it shall be done.”

And the Owls said, “Have we honored the summer-house by occupying it all these years—­and is the horrid light of noonday to be let in on us at last?  My lords and gentlemen, the Constitution is destroyed!”

They passed a resolution to that effect, as is the manner of their kind.  And then they shut their eyes again, and felt that they had done their duty.

The same night, on their way to the fields, they observed with dismay a light in one of the windows of the house.  What did the light mean?

It meant, in the first place, that the lawsuit was over at last.  It meant, in the second place that the owner of Windygates, wanting money, had decided on letting the property.  It meant, in the third place, that the property had found a tenant, and was to be renovated immediately out of doors and in.  The Owls shrieked as they flapped along the lanes in the darkness, And that night they struck at a mouse—­and missed him.

The next morning, the Owls—­fast asleep in charge of the Constitution—­were roused by voices of featherless beings all round them.  They opened their eyes, under protest, and saw instruments of destruction attacking the creepers.  Now in one direction, and now in another, those instruments let in on the summer-house the horrid light of day.  But the Owls were equal to the occasion.  They ruffled their feathers, and cried, “No surrender!” The featherless beings plied their work cheerfully, and answered, “Reform!” The creepers were torn down this way and that.  The horrid daylight poured in brighter and brighter.  The Owls had barely time to pass a new resolution, namely, “That we do stand by the Constitution,” when a ray of the outer sunlight flashed into their eyes, and sent them flying headlong to the nearest shade.  There they sat winking, while the summer-house was cleared of the rank growth that had choked it up, while the rotten wood-work was renewed, while all the murky place was purified with air and light.  And when the world saw it, and said, “Now we shall do!” the Owls shut their eyes in pious remembrance of the darkness, and answered, “My lords and gentlemen, the Constitution is destroyed!”

CHAPTER THE SECOND.

THE GUESTS.

Who was responsible for the reform of the summer-house?  The new tenant at Windygates was responsible.

And who was the new tenant?

Come, and see.

In the spring of eighteen hundred and sixty-eight the summer-house had been the dismal dwelling-place of a pair of owls.  In the autumn of the same year the summer-house was the lively gathering-place of a crowd of ladies and gentlemen, assembled at a lawn party—­the guests of the tenant who had taken Windygates.