_fete_ at Frogmore, when, to form a prominent feature in
the day's amusements, her favourites, the Etonians, were invited to
play a cricket-match, for which a beautiful space of lawn had already
been most good-naturedly prepared.

I think the first approach to royalty must ever be most interesting to
boys, at least it was deeply so to me on this day; for when I observed
the wide-swelling lawns, the broad groves, and glassy lakes of this
little paradise; the Queen, with the princesses and royal suite, as
they glided over the turf in a train of pony-carriages, lined and
shining with the richest satins; the splendid and gaudy clusters of
marquees, glittering in all the pride of Tippoo's eastern
magnificence, from whom they had been rifled, with their bright
crescents blazing in the sunbeams--I found all the lovely and dearly
remembered fancies, conjured before my infant imagination by the
nursery tale, at once placed in delightful reality before me.

Towards the evening, I had rambled, considerably fatigued with the
restless pleasures of the day, into the most secluded parts of the
shrubberies, and was resting on a seat, listening to the notes of a
bugle band in the distance, when they were interrupted by the steps of
some one passing quickly along the gravel walk towards me, and the
next moment I saw a girl approaching the gate in front of me. I
instantly rose and opened it for her; but as she passed, the little
girl, after a slight hesitation, inquired with an expression of some
anxiety if I had seen her father, Sir George Curzon.

"I do not know your father by sight," I answered, "and fear you will
hardly meet with him here; for I have been more than half an hour on
this seat, and have seen no one at all."

"I declare," she sighed, "I do not know how I shall find him, and I am
quite tired, too! But will you, if you please, tell me the way towards
the palace--I should be much obliged to you?"

"As well as I can," I answered; "but would it not be better that I ran
and inquired for your father, and brought him here, for then, in the
meanwhile, as you are tired, you can rest yourself on this bench?"

"You are very good-natured," replied Miss Curzon, as she sat down;
"but if you will only wait until I have rested for a minute, perhaps
you will go with me towards the palace, for I don't like being here
quite alone."

I now perceived that the poor little girl had been crying.

"But why are you here by yourself?" she a