bandon_, and yet shaded with such
delicacy. At the conclusion of the act, where the orchestra adds its
overpowering _tour de force_ to the singers', the audience burst into
applause that lasted for several minutes. It was the spontaneous
gratitude of hundreds of war-tired souls whose bonds had been relaxed
for an hour by the magic touch of music.

'Do you think the tenor is good-looking?' asked Lady Erskin of no one
in particular.

'Who is that in the opposite box, with the leopard's skin on her
shoulders?' queried the rector's wife.

'I think Butterfly is topping,' said Lady Erskin's daughter. 'I always
weep buckets in the second act.'

'I should like to die to music like that,' said Elise, almost to
herself.

II.

Close by a communication-trench, Dick Durwent stood shivering in the
cool night-air. He was waiting to go forward on sentry-duty, the
remainder of the relief having gathered at the other end of the
reserve-trench in which he was standing; but though it was spring,
there was a chill and a dampness in the air that seemed to breathe from
the pores of the mutilated earth. A desultory shelling was going on,
but for a week past a comparative calm had succeeded the hideous
nightmare of March and early April, when Germany had so nearly swept
the board clean of stakes.

He heard the voices of a carrying-party coming up, and suddenly he
crouched low. There was a horrible whine, growing to a shriek--and a
shell burst a few yards away. Shaken and almost deafened, Durwent
remained where he was until he saw an object roll nearly to his feet.
It was a jar of rum that was being brought up for issue. He lifted the
thing up, and again he shivered in the raw air like one sickening of
the ague. Quick as the thought itself, he put the jar down, and
seizing his water-bottle, emptied its contents on the ground. Kneeling
down, he filled it with rum, and leaving the jar lying at such an angle
that it would appear to have spilled a certain amount, he hurriedly
joined the rest of the relief warned for duty.

Dick had been on guard in the front line for an hour, when he received
word that a patrol was going out. A moment later they passed him, an
officer and two men, and he saw them quietly climb over the parapet
which had been hastily improvised when the battalion took over the
position. They had been gone only a couple of minutes when
pistol-shots rang out, and the flares thrown up revealed a shadowy
fight b