Walden laughed.

“Don’t open the old argument, Bainton!” he said good-humouredly; “We have talked of this before.  I like a bit of wild Nature sometimes.”

“Wild natur!” echoed Bainton.  “Seems to me natur allus wants a bit of a wash an’ brush up ’fore she sits down to her master’s table;—­ an’ who’s ‘er master?  Man!  She’s jest like a child comin’ out of a play in the woods, an’ ’er ‘air’s all blown, an’ ’er nails is all dirty.  That’s natur!  Trim ‘er up an’ curl ’er ‘air an’ she’s worth looking at.  Natur!  Lor’, Passon, if ye likes wild natur ye ain’t got no call to keep a gard’ner.  But if ye pays me an’ keeps me, ye must ’spect me to do my duty.  Wherefore I sez:  why not ’ave this ’ere musty-fusty place, a reg’ler breedin’ ’ole for hinsects, wopses, ‘ornits, snails an’ green caterpillars—­ah! an’ I shouldn’t wonder if potato-fly got amongst ’em, too!—­why not, I say, have it cleaned out?”

“I like it as it is,” responded Walden with cheerful imperturbability, and a smile at the thick-set obstinate-looking figure of his ‘head man about the place’ as Bainton loved to be called.  “Have you planted out my phloxes?”

“Planted ’em out every one,” was the reply; “Likewhich the Delphy Inums.  An’ I’ve put enough sweet peas in to supply Covint Garden market, bearin’ in mind as ’ow you sed you couldn’t have enough on ’em.  Sir Morton Pippitt’s Lunnon valet came along while I was a-doin’ of it, an’ ’e peers over the ‘edge an’ ’e sez, sez ’e:  ‘Weedin’ corn, are yer?’ ‘No, ye gowk,’ sez I!  ’Ever seen corn at all ‘cept in a bin?  Mixed wi’ thistles, mebbe?’ An’ then he used a bit of ’is master’s or’nary language, which as ye knows, Passon, is chice—­partic’ler chice.  ‘Evil communications c’rupts good manners’ even in a valet wot ‘as no more to do than wash an’ comb a man like a ‘oss, an’ pocket fifty pun a year for keepin’ of ’is haristocratic master clean.  Lor’!—­what a wurrld it is!—­what a wurrld!”

He had by this time tied up the ‘Crimson rambler’ in orderly fashion, and the Reverend John, stroking his moustache to hide a smile, proceeded to issue various orders according to his usual daily custom.

“Don’t forget to plant some mignonette in the west border, Bainton.  Not the giant kind,—­the odour of the large blooms is rough and coarse compared with that of the smaller variety.  Put plenty of the ‘common stuff’ in,—­such mignonette as our grandmothers grew in their gardens, before you Latin-loving horticultural wise-acres began to try for size rather than sweetness.”

Bainton drew himself up with a quaint assumption of dignity, and by lifting his head a little more, showed his countenance fully,—­a countenance which, though weather-worn and deeply furrowed, was a distinctly intelligent one, shrewd and thoughtful, with sundry little curves of humour lighting up its native expression of saturnine sedateness.