They were entered from a quiet street which showed hardly a sign of life.

There were lions couchant guarding the entrances.

The walls on that side showed mostly blank, uninteresting windows.

With an odd pride the great houses showed only their duller aspects to the world.
All the living-rooms except one looked on the other side; and what a difference! There was a great stretch of emerald-green turf such as one would never look to see in London; to be sure, gardeners had been watering and mowing and rolling it for over a century.

In the turf were many flower-beds, and here and there were forest trees which had been there when the district was fields.