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man maxim-must be the guiding principle. Ministerial responsibility, extended parliamentary rights, have to be claimed, as the least reforms, whilst looking forward to larger possibilities in the future. If Social Democrats will aid in that work, all the better. would certainly be better than to fling in the face of the most advanced men, who willingly work also for social Reforms, the charge of their being, together with the Conservatives, "one reactionary mass." Such accusations only make for militarist and bureaucratic reaction.

Another word of necessary admoni

tion. Any attempt from abroad of dictating to the German nation as to its right of looking to its own security on land or at sea, will have a fatal effect. Even in a Liberal London paper it was recently said that the creation of a strong fleet is an "un-German" enterprise. History itself-witness our Hansa-disproves the assertion. I recollect too well how, in days gone by, any proposal of amelioration in English State affairs was always denounced here, by arch-reactionists, as "un-English." That word is scarcely used now any longer.

The French fleet is superior to that of Germany. So was the Russian Navy until lately, and it is now being rebuilt with the money of the French ally of Czardom. Almost all nations of any importance are strengthening their naval armaments. Japan does So. The United States of America are doing the same, though for what purpose, being in no danger of attack, nobody could say. Germany still ranks fifth only in strength at sea; yet she is exposed to manifold dangers, and has to look to the safety of her increasing over-sea trade.

Will any one say that the increase of a navy is un-French, un-Russian, unAmerican, un-Japanese? If words of that kind were used, the answers would

quickly come in rather unpleasant

terms.

Language held by a late Lord of the British Admiralty as to the necessity of "smashing a certain navy in the North Sea before even people knew that there was a declaration of war," has made a deep impression in Germany-not in the way of fear, but of greater readiness for preparing against a possible danger. The revelations of M. Delcassé have added to that feeling. He asserted, uncontradicted, that "100,000 English troops had been promised to him for a landing in Schleswig-Holstein" in a certain eventuality! When it was seen that even in a Social Democratic organ of this country the return to office of M. Delcassé-who had laid a plan of attack against Germany, and who, therefore, was overthrown by the prudent and wise action of Socialist Republican leaders in Francewas repeatedly wished for, and that those French Socialists were blamed here by English comrades, the impression in Germany grew still deeper.

I mention all this from a sincere wish of seeing peace and goodwill upheld and promoted between Germany and England as well as between Germany and France. To threaten Germans with the British trident is the best means of furthering the cause of "personal government" among them, and of hampering the efforts of men who want to make an end of that nuisance for the sake of greater freedom. A nation's independence being its first natural concern, there will always be a rapid rally round its defender, whoever he may be. If German freemen are to set out for "riding down" reactionary tendencies at home, they must not be menaced from abroad.

Let this not be forgotten by those who talk so loudly about the desirability of overthrowing Imperial absolutism, and who have even gone to the strange length of describing the adhe

rents of the Pope's personal government as true defenders of liberty, whilst picturing as "most moderate The Nineteenth Century and After.

reformers" a party which in their own country they load with abuse.

Karl Blind.

CHAPTER I.

THE ENEMY'S CAMP.

"I'll put the kettle on," said William, stepping off the plank that somewhat insecurely bridged the small lagoon of mud beyond the stile, "and," but he stopped abruptly in the middle of both sentence and progress, his eyes and mouth wide open with astonishment and his right foot slightly in advance of the left. The others, concerned with the passage, did not at first notice anything, but when they, too, had reached firm ground they had leisure to follow their friend's gaze and to share in his emotion. The frown of concentration incidental to lighting a pipe while crossing a narrow plank remained on Talbot's brow, though the match that he had just struck burned away unheeded. The Admiral's hand remained motionless on the crown of the battered straw hat that it had been settling more comfortably on the back of his head, while his face lengthened in pained displeasure.

So they might have stood for some time had not Talbot's match suddenly restored him to activity by burning his fingers. Casting the charred fragment on the ground he stamped on it viciously, and then found his tongue. "Where did he get them?" he asked, raising his eyes again to the object of scrutiny.

"I haven't an idea," returned William endeavoring, as always, to answer the question.

"Consider the lilies," said the Admiral, who belonged to a profession that enjoys its opportunities for sar

casm.

To a stranger the scene would hardly

have seemed to call for a display of emotion, nor would he have found it easy to explain why indignation was so rapidly succeeding surprise in the demeanor of the three. The sun had lost something of its fierceness, and had reached that period of its decline when men may truthfully aver that it is cooler than it was. From a pleasant angle it shone upon as fair a picture of meadow, river, and tree as may be found in the Western Midlands. Ou the right of the three men a steep knoll sloped up almost from the river bank. Elms crowned its summit and a great oak guarded its base. A line of willows separated it from the meadows sleeping in the sunlight beyond, while behind was the little forest of osiers through which they had come. On the left lay the river, deep and sluggish, its further bank lined with old twisted willows which marked its sinuous course away into the distance and the woods, its nearer bank fringed with thick clumps of reeds, in whose bays were white and yellow water-lilies, and with the paler green of sedges. was no babble of gravelly shallows to disturb the restfulness of the picture. By dint of slow perpetual motion the river had worn out a little bay at the foot of the knoll, almost under the shadow of the oak-tree, and therein was lying a house-boat, misty gray in color and almost luminous in the evening sun. At its stern was a flag-staff from which the Union Jack drooped idly.

There

But it was on none of these things that the friends had concentrated their attention. They had eyes for nothing

but a man reclining on a canvas chair on the roof of the house-boat, obviously in a position of considerable comfort, possibly of comfort greater than was good for one who had not yet reached the prime of life; but this of itself was hardly enough to explain the ferocity now levelled at him from three pairs of eyes. Nor was there anything noticeable in him otherwise to the casual eye. He wore a suit of dark blue, which was plainly, even in his attitude of repose, of good cut and fit; one leg, crossed over the other, displayed a neat boot of an unostentatious brown,-that sober and gentlemanly brown of good leather carefully tended which is only attained by a man with a real sense of the niceties of dress; a decent inch of shirt-cuff showed modestly beyond his coat-sleeve, giving a hint of the gold links that secured it, and a Panama hat with a broad brim was tilted on his face till it almost touched a tall and very white collar. The disposition of the hat suggested slumber; but set him on his feet, and he might have appeared in the pavilion at Lord's or behind the Ditch on a fine day in July without seeming out of place on the score of apparel. Altogether he seemed a credit to the house-boat which supported him; he gave it an air of social stability, and suggested a blending of the graces of town and the relaxation of the country essentially gratifying to the urbane mind.

However, the men on the bank had presumably lost their urbanity of mind if they had ever possessed such a quality, for they regarded him with unmixed irritation. "I suppose," said Talbot scornfully, "he thinks this is Henley, and himself the cynosure of every eye."

"It can't be that, or he wouldn't be asleep," William objected with great justice. "It's sheer vanity."

"We have been here less than a day," said the Admiral, "and he has returned

to the toga already. If we don't take steps he will no doubt dress for dinner." The Admiral's voice had that ring of decision in it that always brought an expression of studied innocence into the faces of the large unruly boys at the bottom of the Lower Sixth, and he stooped for a convenient piece of stick.

The missile struck the sleeper on the elbow and roused him to rub his eyes, push his hat back, and sit up. "Hullo!" he said, seeing his friends. "Got back? Nearly tea-time isn't it? What's the matter?" he added, as his slowly returning consciousness grasped the fact that they were considering him with disapproval.

"Why, if one may ask, have you put those things on?" asked the Admiral in his magisterial manner.

"You're in the country, you know, on the river, camping out," explained William, kindly explicit, moved by the evident lack of comprehension in the face of the accused.

"So are we," added Talbot, "and if you think we came down here to wear collars, and look like tailor's dummies generally, you're mistaken."

The terms of the indictment were now clear and Sir Seymour Haddon (commonly known as Charles from a certain propensity to magnificence) regarded as much of himself as he could see complacently. "These things?" he said with a fine air of depreciation. "Oh, well, I had a bathe after you fellows were gone, and I thought I'd try on this new suit; it only came just before I left town, and my man packed it straight away. I think it's a very decent fit." Then he surveyed the others and laughed. "I suppose it is a bit of a contrast," he added; "but you want somebody to look decent."

The urbane mind would very probably have assented heartily to this after even a superficial study of the three. Indeed, a glance at William alone

The

would have settled the matter. garments which he wore with the ease of long familiarity consisted of a cricketing shirt open at the throat, a pair of flannel trousers too short for him, and a flannel coat of a color that was no color but the accidental result of several. Upon his head was a white linen hat, whose brim, innocent of starch, flapped comically over a nose that had already been a little touched by the sun. The others might be described as variants of the same disreputable type, Talbot having a small advantage in an enormous gray felt hat, designed originally perhaps for some German professor, but in our unintellectual climate long since robbed of all shape and style, of everything indeed save color and size.

"You look unmitigated ruffians," pursued Charles frankly. "All right, don't throw," he added in haste as with one consent the others began to stoop.

"Take them off then," said Talbot, in the tone of one who dictates terms.

"I'm going to," conceded the weaker party. "I'm going in again before tea." Therewith he descended the companion-ladder and disappeared within the house-boat.

"Now for the kettle," said William, and they moved on again. A little higher up the bank stood a small white bell-tent, and at its door a long trestletable was set out with a bench on either side. A rude fire-place built of bricks with an iron grid above it served for the kitchen of the expedition, and William was soon coaxing the still smouldering embers into a flame with bits of dry stick, while the others produced food and crockery from the tent and laid them out on the table.

Talbot paused, with a loaf of bread in one hand and a pot of marmalade in the other, and spoke solemnly. "They ought to be taken away from him."

The others nodded assent, and William putting the kettle on the now crackling fire rose to his feet. "Yes," he said, "it's a distinct breach of the agreement, that every man should only bring his oldest clothes."

"We should have people coming here to look at him," Talbot remarked.

"That's what he wants," said the Admiral unkindly. At this moment a loud splash announced that the object of discussion had "gone in again," and presently his head was apparent in the distance as he swam strongly down stream.

Talbot put down the loaf and the marmalade and walked swiftly to the house-boat, crossed the plank that joined it to the shore, and went inside. Presently he emerged carrying a fat Gladstone bag, with which he returned. "I've got them," he said; "half-a-dozen white linen shirts, if you please, and no end of collars and ties. I've left him his flannels on his locker."

"What are you going to do with the bag?" asked William.

"Hide it," returned Talbot briefly; "I know a place." And without more ado he went off in the direction of the osier-bed, from which they had originally come.

"Got the courage of his convictions. "Justum ac tenacem propositi virum," commented the Admiral when he had gone, as he ladled tea lavishly into the pot with a tablespoon.

The kettle had been boiling some time when Talbot returned, and he found the others already at tea. He nodded in answer to their questions and sat down. "No, I shan't say where I've put it," he said; "one of you might let it out by accident. He won't notice it at first probably, because he put the things back into it before he bathed and hid the bag in the kitchen. When he does, he'll be too slack to worry much. It's lucky there are no women anywhere round here." And

with this unchivalrous sentiment Talbot poured himself out some tea.

"Women are not unwelcome in their proper sphere," said the Admiral, as one who concedes a point generously; "but they would be impossible for camping-out. The modern woman wants such a lot of attention, and she would insist on our shaving. That's the worst of a person like Charles, whose instinct it is to shave every day; he encourages the sex in its tyranny." The Admiral (who, by the way, was so called, not from any nautical skill above the common, but because his name was Crichton) felt his chin as he spoke; but it was still beardless. Civilization had only released him early that morning.

He

Presently Charles approached. looked somewhat languid after his swim, and even though he was now in flannels struck a note of elegance that was impressive amid these surroundings. "There's a jolly weir about a quarter of a mile down," he said. "I shall have the bottom boards out of the dinghy and toboggan down it." "Did you see Majendie?" asked William.

Charles shook his head.

"He took the boat through the lock," he replied, "and he hadn't come back, while I was in the water." He ate some bread and butter meditatively. "Isn't there a place called Handcote somewhere near here?" he asked after a pause.

"Yes," said William who knew the district. "Why?"

"I know some people who live there," Charles explained, "people called Grove. There are two nice girls. I must go over and call, and we could have them out to tea."

The others exchanged a glance, and Talbot expressed the common thought, with sarcastic emphasis. "My dear Charles, we have not come down here to mix in the world of fashion and beauty. You can go and call if you LIVING AGE. VOL. XXXV. 1818

want to, though I should have thought that in your crowded life you would have enjoyed a fortnight of freedom. But we are not going to entertain young ladies here, are we, Admiral?" "Certainly not," said the person addressed, with decision.

"Oh well," conceded Charles, "it doesn't matter. I don't know them very well. Here's Majendie," he added as the noise of oars reached them.

The approaching dinghy soon touched the bank, and the man in it jumped out and fastened the painter to a stake. Then he hurried towards them. "Tea? Excellent," he said briskly, "just what I was longing for. The chub are beginning to rise in the mill-pool," he added turning to Talbot, who nodded.

"I'll have a go for them after tea," he replied. "Have you been far?"

"About a mile below the lock," said Majendie, "and a bit of the way up the back-water. There are some more people camping out there," he announced as he stirred the sugar in his tea.

"House-boat?" asked William.

"No, tents, three I think; I didn't go very close. They're well up the back-water on that little promontory below the weir-pool."

"Did you see any of the men?" asked the Admiral.

Majendie adjusted his eyeglasses. "No," he said slowly, "I didn't see any of the men, but I fancy I saw some parasols."

"Saw what?" said Talbot in rather a startled tone, and the others echoed the question.

"Parasols," repeated Majendie, not ill-pleased with the sensation he had created; "two of them, a red one and a blue one; but it doesn't follow they belonged to the tents."

Talbot shook his head gloomily. "Sure to," he said. "Where else could they come from? It's miles from the

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