nse."

"But," said the counsel in the case, "it's to be ten. It isn't about
John, it's Dixy's mouth, uncle."

"Oh, you darling little liar!" Here she kissed him and was silent. "It
won't do," he said. "There's no logic in a kiss, Miss Grey. First comes
Ann Grey and says, too much army discipline; and then you tell me what
that gossiping old darkey says, and then you try the final argument--a
kiss. Can't do it. There will be an end of all discipline. I hate
practical jokes. There!"

If he thought to finish the matter thus, he much undervalued the
ingenuity and persistency of the young Portia who was now conducting the
case.

"Suppose you take a chair, Miss Grey. It is rather warm to provide
permanent human seats for stout young women--"

"I'm not stout," said Leila with emphasis, accepting the hint by dropping
with coiled legs upon a cushion at his feet. "I'm not stout. I weigh one
hundred and thirty and a half pounds. And oh! isn't it hot. I haven't had
a swim for--oh, at least five days counting Sunday." The pool was kept
free until noon for Leila and her aunt.

"Why didn't you swim?" he asked lightly, being too intellectually busy
clearing his pipe to see where the leading counsel was conducting him.

"Why, Uncle Jim, I wouldn't swim if John wasn't allowed too; I just
couldn't. I'm going to bed--but, please, don't let Pat ride Dixy."

"I can attend to my stables, Miss Grey. John won't die of heat for want
of a swim. You don't seem to concern yourself with those equally
overbaked young scamps in Westways."

"Uncle Jim, you're just real mean to-night. Josiah told me yesterday that
my cousin beat Tom McGregor because he said it was mean of you to stop
the swimming. John said it was just, and Tom said he was a liar, and--oh,
my! John licked him--wish I'd seen it."

This was news quite to his liking. He made no reply, lost in wonder over
the ways of the mind male and female.

"You ought to be ashamed, you a girl, to want to see a fight. It's time
you went to school. Isn't the rector on the porch? I thought I heard
him."

Now, of late Leila had got to that stage of the game of
thought-interchange when the young proudly use newly acquired
word-counters. "I think, Uncle Jim, you're--you're irreverent."

The Squire shut the door on all outward show of mirth, and said gravely,
"Isn't it pronounced irrelevant, my dear Miss Malaprop?"

"Yes--yes," said Leila. "That's a word John uses. It's just short for
'flying