the eyes of the boys fairly bolted over the mere
thought of a journey so full of risks and perils.

"It must have been prime!" calmly observed Chris, always to the front if
danger were in the air. "What did you think about, Clary, when the
funicular came jolting down the steps hewn out for it in the steep
mountain? What did it feel like? Come now, tell us," persisted Chris
curiously.

"I fink it was like stepping out of a high window into the dark night,"
explained the little maid. "I didn't like it, an' I pulled the wire to
shut my dolly's eyes, case she saw and it f'itened her, y' know!" The
first thought of mother Clary had been for her waxen baby.

"Well, let's play at the funicular," suggested Oliver, when the
gingerbread plate was cleared.

"Hooray! Down the banisters?" Mark was on fire in a moment. So were the
other boys, and there was a stampede for the staircase.

"You can come, too, Clary!" shouted her brothers, and, bustling out of
the rocking-chair, the little mother carefully carried her baby
treasure, wrapped in a tiny shawl, for the perilous journey down the
mountain-side.

The Tile House was of considerable size: it and the White House where
Doctor George Carew lived were the only two large dwellings in the
village of Allonby Edge. But of the two the Tile House was the higher,
having an extra storey. The staircase was, consequently, a pretty long
one, with only one landing at the upper floor, which led up to the play
attic and servants' rooms.

"Couldn't have a better railway than this!" said Oliver, his head on one
side as he regarded the length of banister.

Presently, the boys were tasting the fearful joy of precipitating
themselves down the slippery route, which they grandly called the
funicular.

The journeys were accompanied by a good deal of uproar, but the green
baize swing-door shut off the sound from the ears of Euphemia and Mary
Jane in the kitchen.

So the noisy crew had it all their own way.

Oliver was the driver of the train, and Mark the guard, the rest being
passengers, and the traffic up and down to the hotel on the high Alps
was something extraordinary.

"It's the going up that's the horrid difficulty!" panted Johnny, whose
legs were rather short to interlace in the banister rails and thus heave
himself upwards as the other boys did.

"Difficulties were made on purpose to be overcome," loftily said Mark,
"and mountain railways are full of them. Now then, Clary," he sh