CHAPTER X.
IN WHICH WE SEE A GOOD DEAL OF MISCHIEF BREWING.
A month went on, and May was well advanced.

The lanes had grown dark and shadowy with their summer bravery; the banks were a rich mass of verdure once more, starred with wild-rose and eglantine; and on the lesser woodland stream, the king fern was again concealing the channel with brilliant golden fronds; while brown bare thorn-thickets, through which the wind had whistled savagely all winter, were now changed into pleasant bowers, where birds might build and sing.
A busy month this had been for the Major.

Fishing every day, and pretty near all day, determined, as he said, to make the most of it, for fear it should be his last year.

There was a beaten path worn through the growing grass all down the side of the stream by his sole exertions; and now the May-fly was coming, and there would be no more fishing in another week, so he worked harder than ever.

Mrs.Buckley used to bring down her son and heir, and sit under an oak by the river-side, sewing.
Pleasant, long days they were when dinner would be brought down to the old tree, and she would spend the day there, among the long meadow-grass, purple and yellow with flowers, bending under the soft west wind.