"You must mean the one with the mermaids," said he.
"If you go in for things like that you should certainly see it," he cried. "Let me see how I can manage it."
"You are very kind," said I. "But I could not think of bothering you in the matter. I dare say that some day I shall have a chance----"
"I have it," he cried. "The family are going away for a fortnight at Easter, and when they are gone I could easily show you over the grounds. I'll just make sure of the day they leave, so that there may be no mistake."
In spite of a promise of such lavish hospitality, I resisted the temptation of being shown over the grounds in the way that was proposed: the fact being that I had no confidence in my own ability to act the part of the housekeeper's nephew or the second footman's uncle who are admitted to the great house when the family are away.
I trust, however, that I convinced the enterprising cousin of the great house that I fully appreciated his spirited offer to allow me a peep at the Borghese fountain through a chink in the back door, as it were.
I learned subsequently that the great family started in a tannery in Mallingham a hundred and twenty years ago. It was no wonder that any one in my station of life could only be expected to approach their demesne by a back way.
On the subject of great houses, I may venture to say, it has always seemed to me to show a singular lack of imagination on the part of some one that one legend should be forced to do duty for so large a group, and this legend so devoid of any stimulating quality. It seems to me that the legends of the country houses of England are, like all Gaul, divided into three parts. All through the south one is shown the room in the mansion in which Queen Elizabeth slept. There is scarcely a Tudor house in which that particular monarch did not sleep for at least one night of her life, and so highly cherished is this family tradition that I have known of cases in which she slept in a room at least sixty years before the mansion itself was built. Then around London one is constantly pointed out by local antiquaries the house in which Nell Gwyn lived. "Madam Ellen" certainly seemed given to "flitting." A dozen houses at least are associated with her name. North of the Tweed we are confronted with the Mary Queen of Scots and the Bonnie Prince Charlie legends. Any story that fails to touch upon the vague history of the worthies whom I have ventured to name as presiding over each department of tradition, seems to be regarded as uninteresting. Although monarchs of quite as blessed memory as Queen Elizabeth must have slept in many mansions in their time, yet few rooms are consecrated to the memory of their slumbers, and although many ladies of the Court were quite as deserving of having their memory enshrined or ensign-ed in the name of a fully licensed public-house as Evelyn's "Impudent Comedian," yet none seem to be regarded as so good a draw as Nell Gwyn. The chairs of Mary Queen of Scots are as plentiful as the mementoes of the other Stuart worthies. I myself have seen in a mansion an Italian cabinet which I was assured had belonged to Queen Mary. But when I asked for evidence on this point I found that there was none forthcoming. I did not get so far as to make such an inquiry in the case of a mahogany looking-glass offered to me by a foolish dealer south of the Tweed, who declared that it had been in the possession of the same unfortunate lady. It was not to me, however, that another dealer tried to sell a dagger that had once been worn by the Young Pretender, the proof of its authenticity being displayed in the roughly cut initials "Y.P.," evidently the work of Bonnie Prince Charlie himself, on the leather sheath.