omestic virtues are, but
how impossible! Besides, how unfashionable!"

Mrs. Buzza reflected.

"I will!" she exclaimed at last. Just then her husband's voice
detonated in the room above. She arose, trembling like a leaf.
"Be firm," said her adviser.

"I will."

"Sit down again. It will do him no harm to wait."

Mrs. Buzza obeyed, still trembling.

It was at this moment that the Honourable Frederic re-entered the
room, and looked around with a slow smile.

"Nellie," he observed, when they were outside the house, "you're a
vastly clever woman, my love."

"How's the Admiral?" was the reply.

"He nibbles, my angel; he bites."

"I heard him barkin'. An' how long will Brady be givin' us?"

"Two months, my treasure."

Mrs. Goodwyn-Sandys reflected for a moment, and then made the
following extraordinary reply--

"Be aisy, me dear. In six weeks I'll be ready to elope from yez."

What passed between the Admiral and Mrs. Buzza when they were left
together was never fully known. But it was quickly whispered that in
No. 2, Alma Villas, the worm had turned. Oddly enough, the spread of
conjugal estrangement did not end here. It began to be rumoured that
Lawyer Pellow and his wife had "differences "; that Mr. and Mrs.
Simpson dined at different hours; and that the elder Miss Strip had
broken off a very suitable match with a young ship's chandler, on
the ground that ship's candles were not "genteel." It was about
this time, too, that Mrs. Wapshot, at the confectionery shop, refused
to walk with Mr. Wapshot on the Rope-walk after Sunday evening
service, because domestic bliss was "horrid vulgar"; and Mrs.
Goodwyn-Sandys' dictum that "one admirer, at least, was no more than
a married woman's due," only failed of acceptance because the supply
of admirers in Troy fell short of the demand. She had herself
annexed Samuel Buzza and Mr. Moggridge.

Meanwhile the Admiral was not idle; and had anything been needed to
whet his desire for a Club, it would have been found in a dreadful
event that happened shortly afterwards.

It was May-morning, and the Admiral was planted in the sunshine
outside No. 2, Alma Villas, loudly discussing the question of the
hour with Mr. Goodwyn-Sandys, Lawyer Pellow, and the little Doctor.

"No, we can't have him," he was roundly declaring; "the Club must be
select, or it is useless to discuss it further."

"Must draw the line somewhere," murmured the Honourable Frederic.

"Q