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er Carlisle assizes,some six weeks later. It was proved that he was the most desperaterogue in the North of England, for he had done three murders at theleast, and there were charges enough against him upon the sheet to havehanged him ten times over.

Well now, I could not pass over my boyhood without telling you aboutthis, which was the most important thing that happened to me. But Iwill go off upon no more side tracks; for when I think of all that iscoming, I can see very well that I shall have more than enough to dobefore I have finished. For when a man has only his own little privatetale to tell, it often takes him all his time; but when he gets mixed upin such great matters as I shall have to speak about, then it is hard onhim, if he has not been brought up to it, to get it all set down to hisliking. But my memory is as good as ever, thank God, and I shall try toget it all straight before I finish.

It was this business of the burglar that first made a friendship betweenJim Horscrof

ad all the way is like a circus," the young soldier observed, "and there isn't a thing to be seen when you get there. The naval airmen were all over the place at daybreak, and Captain Griffiths wasn't far behind them. You didn't leave much for the sightseers, sir," he concluded, turning to his neighbour.

"As Commandant of the place," Captain Griffiths replied, "I naturally had to have the Common searched. With the exception of the observation car, however, I think that I am betraying no confidences in telling you that we discovered nothing of interest."

"Do you suppose that the Zeppelin was in difficulties, as she was flying so low?" Helen enquired.

"It is a perfectly reasonable hypothesis," the Commandant assented. "Two patrol boats were sent out early this morning, in search of her. An old man whom I saw at Waburne declares that she passed like a long, black cloud, just over his head, and that he was almost deafened by the noise of the engines. Personally, I cannot believe that they wou

gish insect food that I felt the moment degrading.

Kitty was, I felt, being a little too clever over it.

"How is he wounded?" she asked.

The caller traced a pattern on the carpet with her blunt toe.

"I don't know how to put it; he's not exactly wounded. A shell burst--"

"Concussion?" suggested Kitty.

She answered with an odd glibness and humility, as though tendering us a term she had long brooded over without arriving at comprehension, and hoping that our superior intelligences would make something of it:

"Shell-shock." Our faces did not illumine, so she dragged on lamely, "Anyway, he's not well." Again she played with her purse. Her face was visibly damp.

"Not well? Is he dangerously ill?"

"Oh, no." She was too kind to harrow us. "Not dangerously ill."

Kitty brutally permitted a silence to fall. Our caller could not bear it, and broke it in a voice that nervousness had turned to a funny, diffident croak.

"He's in the Queen Mary Hos

d has been living there these fourteen years past.'

'A Polish nobleman?' I asked.

'Nay, we breed no such men in Poland,' he answered.

'A Frenchman, then?' cried Duroc.

'They say that he came from France.'

'And with red hair?'

'As red as a fox.'

'Yes, yes, it is my man,' cried my companion, quivering all over in his excitement. 'It is the hand of Providence which has led me here. Who can say that there is not justice in this world? Come, Monsieur Gerard, for I must see the men safely quartered before I can attend to this private matter.'

He spurred on his horse, and ten minutes later we were at the door of the inn of Arensdorf, where his men were to find their quarters for the night.

Well, all this was no affair of mine, and I could not imagine what the meaning of it might be. Rossel was still far off, but I determined to ride on for a few hours and take my chance of some wayside barn in which I could find shelter for Rataplan and myself. I had mou

--at the photograph, and got that feel of drive and force. And in the evenings Harvey came, and she lost it. For, outside of a frame, he became a rather sturdy figure, of no romance, but of a comforting solidity. A kindly young man, with a rather wide face and hands disfigured as to fingers by much early baseball. He had heavy shoulders, the sort a girl might rely on to carry many burdens. A younger and tidier Uncle James, indeed--the same cheery manner, the same robust integrity, and the same small ambition.

To earn enough to keep those dependent on him, and to do it fairly; to tell the truth and wear clean linen and not run into debt; and to marry Sara Lee and love and cherish her all his life--this was Harvey. A plain and likable man, a lover and husband to be sure of. But--

He came that night to see Sara Lee. There was nothing unusual about that. He came every night. But he came that night full of determination. That was not unusual, either, but it had not carried him far. He had no idea tha

m Savannah? Sherman repeatedly said, in his despatches before he started, that he believed Hood would follow him, being compelled to do so by public clamor. What was Sherman's plan when he started for Savannah? Was it simply to effect a change of base, or was it for well-defined ulterior purposes? When did Sherman mature his plan to march to Virginia, and when did that plan first dawn upon Sherman's mind? In this connection, what significance is to be attached to the dates of events in Tennessee, especially the battles of Franklin and Nashville?

GRANT'S FINAL JUDGMENT OF IT

By the first mails which reached Sherman after he arrived on the coast, December 14 and 15, containing letters from Grant dated December 3 and 6, full information was received of the battle of Franklin, which had occurred November 30. Th

irritating when urged by a Boston moralist or aLondon philanthropist upon men whose whole society has been builtupon the assumption that the black is the inferior race. Such apeople like to find the higher morality for themselves, not to haveit imposed upon them by those who live under entirely differentconditions. They feel--and with some reason--that it is a cheapform of virtue which, from the serenity of a well-ordered householdin Beacon Street or Belgrave Square, prescribes what the relationshall be between a white employer and his half-savage,half-childish retainers. Both branches of the Anglo-Celtic racehave grappled with the question, and in each it has led to trouble.

The British Government in South Africa has always played theunpopular part of the friend and protector of the native servants.It was upon this very point that the first friction appearedbetween the old settlers and the new administration. A rising withbloodshed followed the arrest of a Dutch farmer who had maltreatedhis

t there will be no question----"

"Willingly," said the other, rising. "Do not my people serve God as they choose? For you, if you like, the Holy Roman Empire reconstituted with you as its titular head, the sovereignty of central Europe intact--all the half formulated experiments of the West, at the point of the sword. This is your mission--and mine!"

The two men faced each other, eye to eye, but the smaller dominated.

"A pact, my brother," said the man in the hunting-suit, extending his hand.

The Archduke hesitated but a moment longer, and then thrust forward. The hands clasped, while beside the two, the tall man stood like a Viking, his great head bent forward, his forked beard wagging over the table.

"A pact," repeated the Archduke, "which only Death may disrupt."

They stood thus in a long moment of tension. It was he they called Majestät who first relaxed.

"Death?" he smiled. "Who knows? God defends the Empire. It lives on in my sons and yours.

Riches, leisure, opportunity to study for a career upon his stage, are mine if I desire."

"Dost thou desire this, little Ilse?"

"Yes."

"And the man Venem who has followed thee so long?"

"I cannot be what he would have me--a Hausfrau--to mend his linen for my board and lodging."

"And the Fatherland which placed me here on outpost?"

"I take thy place when God relieves thee."

"So ist's recht!... Grüs Gott--Ilse----"

* * * * *

Among the German settlers a five-piece brass band had been organised the year before.

It marched at the funeral of Albrecht Dumont, lately head gamekeeper to nobility in the mountains of a long-lost province.

Three months later Ilse Dumont arrived in Chicago to marry Eddie Brandes. One Benjamin Stull was best man. Others present included "Captain" Quint, "Doc" Curfoot, "Parson" Smawley, Abe Gordon--friends of the bridegroom.

Invited by the bride, among others were Theodor Weishelm, th

to remembrance of the laws under which yelive."

At this sudden outflame of wrath the two witnesses sank theirfaces on to their chests, and sat as men crushed. The Abbotturned his angry eyes away from them and bent them upon theaccused, who met his searching gaze with a firm and composedface.

"What hast thou to say, brother John, upon these weighty thingswhich are urged against you?"

"Little enough, good father, little enough," said the novice,speaking English with a broad West Saxon drawl. The brothers,who were English to a man, pricked up their ears at the sound ofthe homely and yet unfamiliar speech; but the Abbot flushed redwith anger, and struck his hand upon the oaken arm of his chair.

"What talk is this?" he cried. "Is this a tongue to be usedwithin the walls of an old and well-famed monastery? But graceand learning have ever gone hand in hand, and when one is lost itis needless to look for the other."

"I know not about that," said brother John. "I know only thatthe wo