le white-and-gold covered cups on it, from
a sooty box under a kitchen cupboard. A back drawer of the dusty
office desk yielded up half a dozen exquisite prints. And I'm sure
Alicia will remember even in heaven the ecstasy she experienced when
a battered bureau gave into her hands the adorable Bow figures of
Kitty Clive and Woodward the actor, she pink-and-white, petticoated
and furbelowed, lovely as when London went mad over her, and he
cocked-hatted and ruffled and dandified; and neither with so much as
the least littlest chip to mar their perfection.

Or a hair trunk would reveal little frocks stitched by hand, and a
pair of tiny flat slippers with strings gone to dust like the little
feet that had worn them. With these were two dolls, one dressed in
sprigged India muslin and lace, with a shepherdess hat glued on her
painted head; the other dressed in a poke-bonnet, a satin sack, and
a much-flounced skirt. They had evidently belonged to "Lydia, our
Darling Child," whose name, in unsteady letters, was painfully set
down in the printed picture-books at the bottom of the trunk. These
things that had belonged to a "darling child" so long dead lent the
grim old house a softening touch. Poor old house, whose little
children had all gone, so long ago!

It was the day we were taking up the beautiful old carpet in the
back drawing-room. Alicia was rejoicing for the thousandth time over
this treasure of hand-woven French art. Of a sudden, horrible yells
rose from the garden, and a shrieking negro went by the window like
an arrow. We caught "Murder!--Ol' Witch!--Corpses!" as he
disappeared. Uncle Adam, catching his panic, bolted with him; the
two negro women followed. Only Mary Magdalen, amazonian arms bare, a
rolling-pin grasped in a formidable fist, stood like a rock of
defense behind us.

"Ah jes' wants to catch any ol' corpses trapesin' 'round mah
kitchin, trackin' up mah clean flo', an Ah 'll suah settle day hash
once fo' all!" trumpeted Mary Magdalen.

Outside, Schmetz was jumping up and down, flapping his arms, and
screaming in voluble French:

"Name of a dog! Senseless Senegambians, remain! Iron-skulled
offspring of the union of a black mule and a pickax, cease to fly!"

"What is the matter? For heaven's sake? what is the matter?" I
shouted.

"We done dig up de corpses! We done fin' wha'h dat ol' witch 'oman
bury de bodies!" howled a workman in reply.

"Imbeciles, asses, beings without brains, listen to me!"