the British Museum—brisk pedestrians now—not very many minutes after the opening hour of 10 A.M.  It was one of those glowing days which will not be forgotten by many who were in town at the time. The Diamond Jubilee was upon us, and Queen’s weather had already set in. Raffles, indeed, declared it was as hot as Italy and Australia put together; and certainly the short summer nights gave the channels of wood and asphalt and the continents of brick and mortar but little time to cool. At the British Museum the pigeons were crooning among the shadows of the grimy colonnade, and the stalwart janitors looked less stalwart than usual, as though their medals were too heavy for them. I recognized some habitual Readers going to their labor underneath the dome; of mere visitors we seemed among the first.  “That’s the room,” said Raffles, who had bought the two-penny guide, as we studied it openly on the nearest bench; “number 43, upstairs and sharp round to the right. Come on, Bunny!”  And he led the way in silence, but with a long methodical stride which I could not understand until we came to the corridor leading to the Room of Gold, when he turned to me for a moment.  “A hundred and thirty-nine yards from this to the open street,” said Raffles, “not counting the stairs. I suppose we _could_ do it in twenty seconds, but if we did we should have to jump the gates. No, you must remember to loaf out at slow march, Bunny, whether you like it or not.”  “But you talked about a hiding-place for a night?”  “Quite so—for all night. We should have to get back, go on lying low, and saunter out with the crowd next day—after doing the whole show thoroughly.”  “What! With gold in our pockets—”  “And gold in our boots, and gold up the sleeves and legs of our suits!  You leave that to me, Bunny, and wait till you’ve tried two pairs of trousers sewn together at the foot! This is only a preliminary reconnoitre. And here we are.”  It is none of my business to describe the so-called Room of Gold, with which I, for one, was not a little disappointed. The glass cases, which both fill and line it, may contain unique examples of the goldsmith’s art in times and places of which one heard quite enough in the course of one’s classical education; but, from a professional point of view, I would as lief have the ransacking of a single window in the West End as the pick of all those spoils of Etruria and of ancient Greece. The gold may not be so soft as it appears, but it certainly looks as though you could bite off the business ends of the spoons, and stop your own teeth in doing so. Nor should I care to be seen wearing one of the rings; but the greatest fraud of all (from the aforesaid standpoint) is assuredly that very cup of which Raffles had spoken. Moreover, he felt this himself.  “Why, 

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