"Rover is a clever fellow, sure!" "He's a very artful dog!" observed the Captain, whereat Rover wagged his tail, as if he understood what he said and appreciated the compliment--"a very artful dog!" Arrived on shore, presently, the children were in ecstasies at all they saw; for, by only crossing the roadway opposite the land end of the shaky bridge, they at once found themselves within the outlying shrubbery and brushwood of Priory Park, which the kindly proprietor freely threw open for years to the public, without post or paling interfering with their enjoyment, until the vandalism and vulgarity of some cockney excursionists, who wrought untold destruction to the property, led to the rescinding of this privilege! Although touching the sea, the waters of which lapped its turf at high tide, when once within the park, it seemed to Bob and Nellie as if they were miles away already in the heart of the country; so that, accustomed as they had been only to town life, it may be imagined how great the change was to them in every way.
As for runaway Dick from Guildford, who had been familiarised to rustic scenes from his earliest infancy, he could see no beauty in the various objects that each instant delighted the little Londoners' eyes and ears; for, like the hero of Wordsworth's verse, "the primrose by the river's brim" was but a primrose and nothing more to him! To Bob and Nellie, however, the scene around, with its salient features, disclosed a new world.
There were great, nodding, ox-eyed daisies that popped up pertly on either side, staring at them from amidst wastes of wild hyacinths and forget-me-nots that were bluer than Nellie's witching eyes.
Pink and white convolvulus hung in festoons across the bracken-bordered little winding pathways that led here and there through mazes of shrubbery and undergrowth, under the arched wilderness of greenery above.
Rippling rivulets trickling down from nowhere and wandering whither their erratic wills directed, their soft, murmuring voices chiming in with the gayer carols of the birds.
Amongst these could be distinguished the harmonious notes of some not altogether unknown to them, the trill of the lark on high, the whistle of the blackbird in the hidden covert, the "pretty Dick" of the thrush, and the "chink, chink!" of the robin and coo of the dove, mingled with the sweet but subdued song of the yellow-hammer and sharp staccato accompaniment of the untiring chaffinch; while, all the time, a colony of asthmatic old rooks in the taller trees of the park cawed their part in the concert in a deep bass key at regular intervals, "Caw, caw, caw!" Bob and Nellie were so delighted and unsparing of their admiration of everything they saw and heard, that Dick fell to wondering at the pleasure they took in things which he held of little account.
If unappreciative, however, Dick was of some service in telling Nellie the names of the principal wild-flowers; while he rose high in Bob's estimation by his lore in the matter of birds' nests, of which the ex- runaway from the country, naturally, could speak as an expert.
Touching the feathered tribe generally, he was able to tell them off at a glance, with the habits and characteristics of each, as readily as Bob could repeat the Multiplication Table--more so, indeed, if the strict truth be insisted on, without stretching a point! "That be a throosh," he would say; and, "t'other, over there's, a chaffy.

He ain't up to much now; but wait till he be moulted and he'll coom out foine! I've heard tell folks in furrin' parts vallies 'em greatly, though we in Guildford think nowt of they.

I'd rayther a lark mysen, Master Bob." "Ah!" exclaimed Nellie, who had previously been shocked by Dick's lack of sentiment, much pleased now at this expression of a better taste--"you do like their singing then!" "Lawks no, miss," replied the unprincipled boy.

"Larks is foine roasted!" Nellie was horrified.
"You don't mean to say, Dick," she cried, "that--that you actually eat them ?" "Aye, miss," he replied, without an atom of shame, "we doos.

They be rare tasty birds!" She gave him up after this, going along by herself in silence.
"This is jolly!" exclaimed Bob presently, when, after getting a little way within the park and ascending the rise leading up from the shore to an open plateau above, he saw a sort of fairy dell below, at the foot of a grassy slope, the green surface of which was speckled over with daisies and buttercups.