ut of the forest, and then waited under a large
chestnut tree till four or five this morning. As for food, we had not so
much as a mouthful from about three in the afternoon till we got to our
inn early this morning."

"Oh, you poor, poor people! how tired you must be."

"No; we made a good breakfast as soon as we got in, and then went to bed,
where we staid till it was time for us to come to your house."

Here Panky gave his friend a significant look, as much as to say that he
had said enough.

This set Hanky on at once. "Strange to say, the ranger was wearing the
old Erewhonian dress. It did me good to see it again after all these
years. It seems your son lets his men wear what few of the old clothes
they may still have, so long as they keep well away from the town. But
fancy how carefully these poor fellows husband them; why, it must be
seventeen years since the dress was forbidden!"

We all of us have skeletons, large or small, in some cupboard of our
lives, but a well regulated skeleton that will stay in its cupboard
quietly does not much matter. There are skeletons, however, which can
never be quite trusted not to open the cupboard door at some awkward
moment, go down stairs, ring the hall-door bell, with grinning face
announce themselves as the skeleton, and ask whether the master or
mistress is at home. This kind of skeleton, though no bigger than a
rabbit, will sometimes loom large as that of a dinotherium. My father
was Yram's skeleton. True, he was a mere skeleton of a skeleton, for the
chances were thousands to one that he and my mother had perished long
years ago; and even though he rang at the bell, there was no harm that he
either could or would now do to her or hers; still, so long as she did
not certainly know that he was dead, or otherwise precluded from
returning, she could not be sure that he would not one day come back by
the way that he would alone know, and she had rather he should not do so.

Hence, on hearing from Professor Hanky that a man had been seen between
the statues and Sunch'ston wearing the old Erewhonian dress, she was
disquieted and perplexed. The excuse he had evidently made to the
Professors aggravated her uneasiness, for it was an obvious attempt to
escape from an unexpected difficulty. There could be no truth in it. Her
son would as soon think of wearing the old dress himself as of letting
his men do so; and as for having old clothes still to wear out after
seve