, Mrs. Petty. From what else could we draw our
inspiration and comfort in these terrible days?"

Mrs. Petty sniffed. "Well, you can't eat less than you do," she said;
"but you might stop feedin' Blink out of your rations--that I do think."

"I have not found that forbidden as yet in any public utterance,"
returned Mr. Lavender; "but when the Earl of Betternot tells us to stop,
I shall follow his example, you may depend on that. The country comes
before everything." Mrs. Petty tossed her head and murmured darkly--

"Do you suppose he's got an example, Sir?"

"Mrs. Petty," replied Mr. Lavender, "that is quite unworthy of you. But,
tell me, what can we do without?"

"I could do without Joe," responded Mrs. Petty, "now that you're not
using him as chauffeur."

"Please be serious. Joe is an institution; besides, I am thinking of
offering myself to the Government as a speaker now that we may use gas."

"Ah!" said Mrs. Petty.

"I am going down about it to-morrow."

"Indeed, sir!"

"I feel my energies are not fully employed."

"No, sir?"

"By the way, there was a wonderful leader on potatoes yesterday. We must
dig up the garden. Do you know what the subsoil is?"

"Brickbats and dead cats, I expect, sir."

"Ah! We shall soon improve that. Every inch of land reclaimed is a nail
in the coffin of our common enemies."

And going over to a bookcase, Mr. Lavender took out the third from the
top of a pile of newspapers. "Listen!" he said. "'The problem before us
is the extraction of every potential ounce of food. No half measures
must content us. Potatoes! Potatoes! No matter how, where, when the
prime national necessity is now the growth of potatoes. All Britons
should join in raising a plant which may be our very salvation.

"Fudge!" murmured Mrs. Petty.

Mr. Lavender read on, and his eyes glowed.

"Ah!" he thought, "I, too, can do my bit to save England.... It needs but
the spark to burn away the dross of this terrible horse-sense which keeps
the country back.

"Mrs. Petty!" But Mrs. Petty was already not.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

The grass never grew under the feet of Mr. Lavender, No sooner had he
formed his sudden resolve than he wrote to what he conceived to be the
proper quarter, and receiving no reply, went down to the centre of the
official world. It was at time of change and no small national
excitement; brooms were sweeping clean, and new offices had arisen
everywhe