e you like," said Frank, "so long as we're out here on the fresh
grass again. What a treat it is to be among the green trees!"

"Much better than the country, eh?"

"Oh no; but it does very well. I say, I wish we might fish."

"Oh, we'll go fishing some day. Walk faster; we're late."

"Fast as you like. What do you say to a run? You can run, you say,
when you like."

"Oh no, we needn't run; only walk fast."

"Or the ducks will be impatient," said Frank, laughing.

"Yes, or the ducks may be impatient," said Andrew to himself, as he led
on toward the end of the ornamental water nearest to where Buckingham
Palace now stands, and bore off to the left; and when some distance back
along the farther shore of the lake and nearly opposite to Saint James's
Palace, he said suddenly:

"Look, Frank, there is some one beforehand;" and he pointed to where a
gentleman stood by the edge of the water shooting bits of biscuit with
his thumb and finger some distance out, apparently for the sake of
seeing the ducks race after them, some aiding themselves with their
wings, and then paddling back for more.

The two lads walked up to where the gentleman was standing, and as he
heard them approach he turned quickly, and Frank saw that he was a pale,
slight, thin-faced, youngish-looking man who might be forty.

"Ah, Andrew," he said, "you here; how are you? You have not come to
feed the ducks?"

"Oh yes, I have," said Andrew, giving the stranger a peculiar look; "and
I've brought a friend with me. Let me introduce him. Mr Frank Gowan,
Captain Sir Robert Gowan's son, and my fellow-servant with his Royal
Highness. Frank, this happens to be a friend of mine--Mr George
Selby."

"I am very glad to meet any friend of Andrew Forbes," said the stranger,
raising his hat with a most formal bow. "I know Sir Robert slightly."

As he replaced his hat and smiled pleasantly to the salute Frank gave in
return, he took a biscuit from his pocket, and began to break it in very
small pieces, when, apparently without any idea of its looking childish,
Andrew took out his piece of bread, and after a moment's hesitation
Frank did the same, the ducks in his Majesty's "canal," as he termed it,
benefiting largely by the result.

"Any news?" said Andrew, after this had been going on for some minutes,
and as he spoke he turned his head and looked fixedly at Mr Selby.

"No, nothing whatever; everything is as dull as can be," was the reply,
and the