"They couldn't well change for the worse," she
continued; "and queer as it all is there's them as
finds their duties made a lot easier to stand up
under. Don't you be surprised, Mr. Roach, if you
find yourself in the middle of a menagerie and
Martha Sowerby's Dickon more at home than you
or me could ever be."

There really was a sort of Magic about Dickon,
as Mary always privately believed. When Mr.
Roach heard his name he smiled quite leniently.

"He'd be at home in Buckingham Palace or at
the bottom of a coal mine," he said. "And yet
it's not impudence, either. He's just fine, is that
lad."

It was perhaps well he had been prepared or he
might have been startled. When the bedroom
door was opened a large crow, which seemed
quite at home perched on the high back of a carven
chair, announced the entrance of a visitor by saying
"Caw -- Caw" quite loudly. In spite of
Mrs. Medlock's warning, Mr. Roach only just
escaped being sufficiently undignified to jump backward.

The young Rajah was neither in bed nor on his
sofa. He was sitting in an armchair and a young
lamb was standing by him shaking its tail in
feeding-lamb fashion as Dickon knelt giving it milk

[[258]]

p257 _ -chap- _ toc-1 _ p258w _ toc-2 _ +chap+ _ p259

v?