CHAPTER III
The "Lady's" Conservatory
Meantime, the dear "Lady" (who had anticipated our coming to the Mansion House, by a sudden resolve to commit her burden of housekeeping to younger and abler hands—and retain of her old establishment but a single personal attendant—as faithful friend, companion, and amanuensis) wheeled into the very thick of action—had watched with anxious eyes this removal of ancient landmarks—this general upheaval of things. An almost helpless invalid—wheeled daily through eight patient summers into her beloved garden—she had sat with her beautiful silver hair arranged in careful curls, a big white sun-bonnet shading her kind old face, to receive her friends (both gentle and simple) with a cordial hospitality, and an old-time courtesy in fine keeping with herself and her surroundings.
Innately conservative, the Lady was scarce in touch with innovation of any sort. A passionate lover of flowers, but scantily endowed with horticultural talent, and without a spark of creative genius, she smiled with dubious complacency on this awful devastation—comforting herself with the sweet anticipation of spring tulips and summer roses, in her very own garden! Dear Lady—her absolute trust in my gardening ability was indeed touching! One must "live up to the blue china" of one's reputation; so I did my very best; and when all was done, and the out-door darlings nestled safely beneath their winter coverlet, came the pleasure of looking after the house-plants—(by this time well-recovered from the vicissitudes of repotting and removal) and the bestowal of each in its winter quarters; and this leads me to a description of "The Conservatory."
In a warm southwestern angle of "The Mansion House" there nestled a narrow piazza-like structure—opening, by long French windows, from both drawing and sitting room, and leading by a short flight of steps into the old garden.
This erection—having been enclosed by sash-work of glass—and furnished with rugs, a big easy chair, a round table, and a penitential hair-cloth sofa, and supplied with rocking chairs, was, when the temperature permitted, the favorite lounging place of family and guest.
Though warmed only by the sun, it had always been known as "The Conservatory" (probably because herein every autumn, the Lady's geraniums and fuchsias, taken in from the early frost, stood on the corner table, recovering from the fall potting on their way to winter quarters on the broad ledge of a sunny south window of her own bed chamber). Through the winter this unwarmed place was neither available for plant or man.
Long before the possibility of ever moving to the Mansion House had entered my head, I had looked upon this conservatory with loving eyes, and, in fancy, pictured it, warmed and filled all winter long with lovely flowering plants.
A Conservatory had been the dream of my life! And when this fell to my lot, and, abolishing the stuffy cylinder stoves that had, heretofore, warmed the Mansion House, we put in a big furnace, I had directed the leading of a roomy pipe to this glass-enclosed quarter, and the out-door work well over, I pleased myself with arranging this new winter home for my darlings. The light sashes—warped by Time—had become "ram-shackly." I wedged them securely, and stuffing gaps with cotton batting carefully listed the outer door against
"The west wind Mudjekeewis,"