It was very old and rambling, rose-covered in front, ivy-covered behind; it stood on the top of Harrow Hill, between the church and the school, and had once been the vicarage of the parish, but the vicar had left it because it was so far removed from the part of the village where all his work lay.

The drawing-room opened by an old-fashioned half-window, half-door--which proved a constant source of grief to me, for whenever I had on a new frock I always tore it on the bolt as I flew through--into a large garden which sloped down one side of the hill, and was filled with the most delightful old trees, fir and laurel, may, mulberry, hazel, apple, pear, and damson, not to mention currant and gooseberry bushes innumerable, and large strawberry beds spreading down the sunny slopes.

There was not a tree there that I did not climb, and one, a widespreading Portugal laurel, was my private country house.

I had there my bedroom and my sitting-rooms, my study, and my larder.

The larder was supplied by the fruit-trees, from which I was free to pick as I would, and in the study I would sit for hours with some favourite book--Milton's "Paradise Lost" the chief favourite of all.