before kangaroos—gigantic, erect, silhouetted against the light—four buck-kangaroos in the heart of Sussex!
And we retrogressed over the velvet grass till our hind-wheels struck well-rolled gravel, leading us to sanity, main roads, and, half an hour later, the Grapnel Inn at Horsham.
After a great meal we poured libations and made burnt-offerings in honour of Kysh, who received our homage graciously, and, by the way, explained a few things in the natural history line that had puzzled us. England is a most marvellous country, but one is not, till one knows the eccentricities of large landowners, trained to accept kangaroos, zebras, or beavers as part of its landscape.
When we went to bed Pyecroft pressed my hand, his voice thick with emotion.
"We owe it to you," he said. "We owe it all to you. Didn’t I say we never met in pup-pup-puris naturalibus, if I may so put it, without a remarkably hectic day ahead of us?"
"That’s all right,’ I said. "Mind the candle." He was tracing smoke-patterns on the wall.
"But what I want to know is whether we’ll succeed in acclimatisin’ the blighter, or whether Sir William Gardner’s keepers ’ll kill ’im before ’e gets accustomed to ’is surroundin’s?"
Some day, I think, we must go up the Linghurst road and find out.
