nounced to the young lady
in the bar that the excursion trains must be "bringing them in
hundreds."

By eleven o'clock the High Street was packed with crowds that whiled
away their time with staring at the flags and decorations. But it
was not until 1.0 p.m. that there began to flow, always towards the
Pageant Ground, a stream by which that week, among the inhabitants of
Merchester, will always be best remembered; a stream of folk in
strange dresses--knights in armour, ladies in flounces and ruffs,
ancient Britons, greaved Roman legionaries, monks, cavaliers,
Georgian beaux and dames.

It appeared as if all the dead generations of Merchester had
arisen from their tombs and reclaimed possession of her streets.
They shared it, however, with throngs of modern folk, in summer
attire, hurrying from early luncheons to the spectacle.
In the roadway near the Pageant Ground crusaders and nuns jostled
amid motors and cabs of commerce.

For an hour this mad medley poured through the streets of Merchester.
Come with them to the Pageant Ground, where all is arranged now and
ready, waiting the signal!

Punctually at half-past two, from his box on the roof of the Grand
Stand, Mr. Isidore gave the signal for which the orchestra waited.
With a loud outburst of horns and trumpets and a deep rolling of
drums the overture began.

It was the work of a young musician, ambitious to seize his
opportunity. After stating its theme largely, simply, in sixteen
strong chords, it broke into variations in which the audience for a
few moments might read nothing but cacophonous noise, until a gateway
opened in the old wall, and through it a band of white-robed Druids
came streaming towards the stone altar which stood--the sole stage
"property"--in the centre of the green area. Behind them trooped a
mob of skin-clothed savages, yelling as they dragged a woman to the
sacrifice. It was these yells that the music interpreted.
The Pageant had opened, and was chanting in high wild notes to its
own prelude.

Almost before the spectators realised this, the Arch-Druid had
mounted his altar. He held a knife to the victim's throat.
But meanwhile the low beat of a march had crept into the music, and
was asserting itself more and more insistently beneath the
disconnected outcries. It seemed to grow out of distance, to draw
nearer and nearer, as it were the tramp of an armed host. . . .
It _was_ the tramp of a host. . . . As the Arch-Druid, holdin