rls always have to observe the conventions," said Nealie,
with the prim little air which she sometimes put on for the sake of her
juniors.

"What are they?" demanded Billykins, who at this moment ran up from the
other side. But Nealie was spared a lengthy explanation by the timely
arrival of Don upon the scene, calling shrilly upon the others to come
and see a snake which was swallowing a frog, and getting choked in the
process.

"I suppose we ought to kill the snake," said Rupert wearily. "But
personally I would rather not."

"That is how I feel; for after all we have no quarrel with the snake,
and it may be a very harmless creature after all," said Sylvia. "Don't
you remember that Mrs. Warner told us a great many people keep a snake
in their houses in preference to a cat, just to keep the mice down."

"Well, there is no accounting for tastes," said Nealie, and then she
deftly guided Rocky on to the side of the road, drawing rein under the
drooping branches of a lightwood tree, where they could rest for two or
three hours until the fiercest heat of the day was past.

They were not as merry as usual to-day. The heat was so great that they
all wore a more or less wilted appearance.

Presently a breeze sprang up and moaned its way through the trees, and
Nealie decided, with nervous haste, that it was time to be moving on.
She had a great horror of thunderstorms, although she mostly kept it to
herself, and to-day she was vaguely oppressed by a brooding sense of
coming disaster, which was doubtless the effect of the electricity in
the air.

The way at this part was very solitary. Once they passed a bark-roofed
hut standing close to the road; but when they knocked at the door they
found that no one was at home, and so went on their way, by no means
certain that they were taking the right direction, for although the
route lay clear enough before them on paper, in actual fact it was very
hard to find, especially here, where there were so many roads and
beginnings of roads that did not show upon the map.

After some consultation they took the road which seemed the best and the
most used, and, following it, arrived in time on very high ground, from
whence they had a fine view over a great stretch of country, dotted
here and there with little townships and solitary stations, a rich and
fertile land apparently, most of it being under close cultivation.

Thunder grumbled in the west, and the lightning played fitfully alon