ul subjects' grievances may forthwith be sought and
inquired into, and remedy granted thereto by Act of Parliament. And your
petitioners will ever pray."

That was all. What the grievances might be was not stated. He knew that
to hear argument for or against a given case was outside the functions
of the Crown; but he knew equally well that to order inquiry to be made
lay still within his right, though every minister in the Cabinet except
one would seek to deny it to him. And so he sat looking at the crumpled
sheet which meant so much to so many thousands of lives; and slowly the
night went by.

Long before the first chitter of awakening birds, and before the first
hint of light had crept into the east, he heard outside the slow stir of
the city's life breaking back from short uneasy slumber. With stiffened
limbs he got up from his chair, for the room had grown cold and his body
ached with all the strain and exertion it had so recently undergone.
Slowly he moved off towards his own sleeping apartment, in case the
Queen, when she awoke, should send to inquire after him. And on his way,
as a short cut, he crossed the minstrel gallery, which divided one from
the other the two state drawing-rooms,--a broad half-story colonnade,
with central opening and corners draped into shade.

Halfway across this elevation he paused to look down into the vast
chamber below. At some point among its chandeliers burned a small
pinhole of light that revealed in a strange dimness various forms of
furniture, showing monstrous and uncouth in their night attire.
Night-gowns rather than pajamas seemed the general wear; only a few legs
were to be seen. In this, its sleeping aspect, the place was certainly
more harmonious and more chaste than by day; mirrors and pictures loomed
from the white walls with a mystery that would disappear when the
lusters contained their light; and the King lingered to take in the
pleasant strangeness of it all, and to wonder what was this new quality
which so attracted him.

As he did so his ear caught from without a faint reverberation of
muffled sound; even and regular in its beat, it drew near.

At the far end a door was thrown open; a flush of light entered the
chamber, and there came following it a troop of men wearing felt
slippers and long linen aprons, and bearing upon their shoulders brooms,
feather-heads, wash-leathers, brushes, dusters, steps, vacuum-cleaners,
and other mysterious instruments of an unint