rich uncles and judges rarely go on the stage; their occupation might be even more arduous if they had to face such competitors. Anyway, John had enough success with his joke to feel much more hopeful of being able to find suitable presents in Galton for Harold and Frida; and in the silence of exhaustion that succeeded the laughter he broke the news of his having to go into town and dispatch an urgent telegram that very afternoon, mentioning incidentally that he might see about a dog-cart, and, of course, at the same time a horse. Everybody applauded his resolve except his brother-in-law who looked distinctly put out.

"But you won't be gone before I get back?" John asked.

Laurence and Edith exchanged glances fraught with the unuttered solemnities of conjugal comprehension.

"Well, I had wanted to have a talk over things with you after lunch," Laurence explained. "In fact, I have a good deal to talk over. I should suggest driving you in to Galton, but I find it impossible to talk freely while driving. Even our poor old pony has been known to shy. Yes, indeed, poor old Primrose often shies."

John mentally blessed the aged animal's youthful heart, and said, to cover his relief, that old maids were often more skittish than young ones.

"Why?" asked Harold.

Everybody felt that Harold's question was one that should not be answered.

"You wouldn't understand, darling," said his mother; and the dining-room became tense with mystery.

"Of course, if we could have dinner put forward half an hour," said Laurence, dragging the conversation out of the slough of sex, "we could avail ourselves of the moon."

"Yes, you see," Edith put in eagerly, "it wouldn't be so dark with the moon."

Laurence knitted his brow at this and his wife hastened to add that an earlier dinner would bring Frida's bed-time much nearer to its normal hour.

"The point is that I have a great deal to talk over with John," Laurence irritably explained, "and that," he looked as if he would have liked to add "Frida's bed-time can go to the devil," but he swallowed the impious dedication and crumbled his bread.

Finally, notwithstanding that everybody felt very full of roast beef and 

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