ourse of the last Chartist disturbances, three days before the
rising of Parliament. Some sixty or seventy women then caused themselves
to be arrested, and it seems that the Princess was one of them."

"She must be mad!" exclaimed the King in bewilderment. "Whatever could
have induced her?"

"Was your Majesty aware that she had any leanings towards politics?"

"She has ideas," said the King, "like other young people; but she is
generally very busy changing them; and, beyond a notion that a woman
ought always to have her own way, and never be asked to do what she
doesn't want to do, she----" And then it began to dawn upon him--though
only darkly--what Charlotte was really after: she was demonstrating
madly, extravagantly, her claim to personal freedom. And to prove how
much she meant it she had gone to these wild lengths. Well might her
father, in his essentially middle-aged mind, wonder what the younger
generation was coming to.

"Poor dear silly child!" he exclaimed in fond irritation. "Why ever
could she not have waited?"

That was a question the Prime Minister could not answer.

"Well, well," he went on, endeavoring to be philosophical over the
business, "she has had her lesson now; and after all there is no real
harm done."

"Your Majesty must pardon me; it has become a very serious matter," said
the Prime Minister gravely.

"Why? Who knows anything about it? Who need know? She wasn't sentenced
in her own name, I suppose?"

"Certainly not, sir; had she been recognized the thing could never have
happened. She must to some extent have altered her dress and her
appearance: as to that I have no particulars. The name she actually went
in under was Ann Juggins."

"Preposterous!" exclaimed the King. "And supposing that were to come
out!"

"That is the trouble, sir. Without the full and immediate exercise of
your authority, I fear it may. As a matter of fact, that is why she
still remains where we found her."

"Oh! Stuff and nonsense!" cried the King. "You don't come for my
authority in cases of this kind. Let her out, let her out! and say
nothing more about it!"

"The Prefect, sir, has already been to see her, and she refuses to be
let out; that is to say, declares that if she is not allowed to serve
her full sentence she will make the whole of the affair public."

"Public?"

"Name and all. There was her ultimatum; she made a special point of it.
Her Highness seems somehow to be aware that the name is a