pleasant meals. Well, it is
for the sake of the children; and their mother, bless her"--here he
glanced at the picture of the girl over the mantelpiece--"would smile
at me if she could. Oh, yes, I buckle on my armor cheerfully enough.
Hey, for Chaos! Hey, for wild Mirth and childish Frivolity! Here I
come, Eric and Maggie--poor patient little mice that you are! Here's
father at last. Give me your hand, Mag: you may jump on my shoulder,
if you like. Now for a race downstairs to the garden, and then you can
tell me what you got me out of my bed in the middle of the night
for."

Miss Wilton was quite right when she left the Chase the day before.
She certainly would not have enjoyed being awakened from her early
morning slumbers by the wild raid which now took place through the old
house. There was a scamper, a rush, some shouts, not only from
childish throats, but from a manly and decidedly bass voice. The poor
respectable old house would have looked shocked if it could, but who
cared what anything looked or felt when Chaos was abroad?

About three hours later a somewhat draggled-looking party might have
been seen approaching the Chase. They were all dead tired, and all
very untidy, not to say disreputable in appearance. The little girl's
brown Holland frock was not only torn, but smeared with mud and some
sort of green mossy stuff which produces a deep stain very difficult
for laundresses to remove. The little boy was also in a sorry plight,
for he had a scratch across his cheek, and his knickers were cut
through at the knees; while the big boy, in other words, the man,
looked the most untidy, the most fatigued, the most travel-stained of
all.

Ermengarde, in her neat white cool frock, with a green sash tied round
her slim waist, and her long fair hair streaming down her back, came
out to meet this party. She was accompanied by Lucy, who was also neat
and fresh and trim. The two had stepped out of the house to gather a
few flowers to put on the breakfast-table, and now they assumed all
the virtuous airs of those good moral people who do _not_ get up to
catch the early worm.

"_What_ a figure you are, Maggie! and what a disgraceful noise you and
Eric made this morning," she began, in her most grown-up and icy
tones.

"Oh, please don't scold us, Ermengarde," said Mr. Wilton. "Look at our
water-lilies, gaze well at them, and be merciful."

Yes, the water-lilies were superb--each jaded conqueror was laden with
them--