behind his feet, Joe finished the bottle of Bass. "This is a bit of all right!" he thought dreamily. "Lie down, you bitch! Quiet! How can I get my nap while you make that row? Lie down! That's better."

   Blink was silent, gnawing at her string. The smile deepened on Joe's face, his head fell a little one side his mouth fell open a fly flew into it.

   "Ah!" he thought, spitting it out; "dog's quiet now." He slept.

   "'Give them ginger!'" thought Mr. Lavender, approaching the first houses. "My first task, however, will be to collect them."

   "Can you tell me," he said to a dustman, "where the market-place is?"

   "Ain't none."

   "The Town Hall, then?"

   "Likewise."

   "What place is there, then," said Mr. Lavender, "where people congregate?"

   "They don't."

   "Do they never hold public meetings here?"

   "Ah!" said the dustman mysteriously.

   "I wish to address them on the subject of babies."

   "Bill! Gent abaht babies. Where'd he better go?"

   The man addressed, however, who carried a bag of tools, did not stop.

   "You,'ear?" said the dustman, and urging his horse, passed on.

   "How rude!" thought Mr. Lavender. Something cold and wet was pressed against his hand, he felt a turmoil, and saw Blink moving round and round him, curved like a horseshoe, with a bit of string dangling from her white neck. At that moment of discouragement the sight of one who believed in him gave Mr. Lavender nothing but pleasure. "How wonderful dogs are!" he murmured. The sheep-dog responded by bounds and ear-splitting barks, so that two boys and a little 

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