f in it in
our daily practice. Every man is always making fancies about himself;
but it is never his workaday self, but something else. The bank clerk
who pictures himself as a financial Napoleon knows that his own thin
little soul is incapable of it; but he knows, too, that it is possible
enough for that other bigger thing which is not his soul, but yet in
some odd way is bound up with it. I fancy myself a field-marshal in a
European war; but I know perfectly well that if the job were offered
me, I should realise my incompetence and decline. I expect you rather
picture yourself now and then as a sort of Julius Caesar and
empire-maker, and yet, with all respect, my dear chap, I think it would
be rather too much for you."

"There was once a man," I said, "an early Victorian Whig, whose chief
ambitions were to reform the criminal law and abolish slavery. Well,
this dull, estimable man in his leisure moments was Emperor of
Byzantium. He fought great wars and built palaces, and then, when the
time for fancy was past, went into the House of Commons and railed
against militarism and Tory extravagance. That particular king from
Orion had a rather odd sort of earthly tenement."

Thirlstone was all interest. "A philosophic Whig and the throne of
Byzantium. A pretty rum mixture! And yet--yet," and his eyes became
abstracted. "Did you ever know Tommy Lacelles?"

"The man who once governed Deira? Retired now, and lives somewhere in
Kent. Yes, I've met him once or twice. But why?"

"Because," said Thirlstone solemnly, "unless I'm greatly mistaken,
Tommy was another such case, though no man ever guessed it except
myself. I don't mind telling you the story, now that he is retired and
vegetating in his ancestral pastures. Besides, the facts are all in
his favour, and the explanation is our own business....

"His wife was my cousin, and when she died Tommy was left a very
withered, disconsolate man, with no particular object in life. We all
thought he would give up the service, for he was hideously well off and
then one fine day, to our amazement, he was offered Deira, and accepted
it. I was short of a job at the time, for my battalion was at home,
and there was nothing going on anywhere, so I thought I should like to
see what the East Coast of Africa was like, and wrote to Tommy about
it. He jumped at me, cabled offering me what he called his Military
Secretaryship, and I got seconded, and set off. I had never