addressed, were immediately dispatched; in due course they were both
accepted. The house party of the halcyon hours, as the prospective
hostess called it, was auspiciously launched.

Lena Luddleford was not included among the guests, having previously
committed herself to another invitation. At the opening day of a cricket
festival, however, she ran across Lady Prowche, who had motored over from
the other side of the county. She wore the air of one who is not
interested in cricket and not particularly interested in life. She shook
hands limply with Lena, and remarked that it was a beastly day.

"The party, how has it gone off?" asked Lena quickly.

"Don't speak of it!" was the tragical answer; "why do I always have such
rotten luck?"

"But what has happened?"

"It has been awful. Hyaenas could not have behaved with greater
savagery. Sir Richard said so, and he has been in countries where hyaenas
live, so he ought to know. They actually came to blows!"

"Blows?"

"Blows and curses. It really might have been a scene from one of
Hogarth's pictures. I never felt so humiliated in my life. What the
servants must have thought!"

"But who were the offenders?"

"Oh, naturally the very two that we took all the trouble about."

"I thought they agreed on every subject that one could violently disagree
about--religion, politics, vivisection, the Derby decision, the Falconer
Report; what else was there left to quarrel about?"

"My dear, we were fools not to have thought of it. One of them was Pro-
Greek and the other Pro-Bulgar."

HYACINTH

"The new fashion of introducing the candidate's children into an election
contest is a pretty one," said Mrs. Panstreppon; "it takes away something
from the acerbity of party warfare, and it makes an interesting
experience for children to look back on in after years. Still, if you
will listen to my advice, Matilda, you will not take Hyacinth with you
down to Luffbridge on election day."

"Not take Hyacinth!" exclaimed his mother; "but why not? Jutterly is
bringing his three children, and they are going to drive a pair of Nubian
donkeys about the town, to emphasise the fact that their father has been
appointed Colonial Secretary. We are making the demand for a strong Navy
a special feature in _our_ campaign, and it will be particularly
appropriate to have Hyacinth dressed in his sailor suit. He'll look
heavenly."

"The question is, not how he'll look, but