that you have taken an
unfair advantage, a very unfair advantage."

"Here is mine!" exclaimed Dicky nobly. "I hope I can deny myself, Mrs.
Portheris, to that extent."

"And mine," I echoed; "but really, Mrs. Portheris----"

Another pressure of Dicky's hand reminded me--I am ashamed to confess
it--that if Mrs. Portheris was bent upon the unnecessary consumption of
Roman tallow there was nothing in her past treatment of either of us to
induce us to prevent her. The dictates of humanity, I know, should have
influenced us otherwise, in connection with tallow, but they seemed for
the moment to have faded as completely out of our bosoms as they did out
of the early Roman persecutors! It seemed to me that all my country's
wrongs at the hands of Mrs. Portheris rose up and clamoured to be
avenged, and Dicky told me afterward that he felt just the same way.

"Then I have done you an injustice," she continued; "I apologize, I am
sure, and I find that I have my own candle, thank you. It is adhering to
the side of my bonnet."

We were perfectly silent.

"Perhaps I ought to try and wait a little longer," Mrs. Portheris
hesitated, "but I feel such a sinking, and I assure you I have fallen
away. My garments are quite loose."

"Of course it depends," said Dicky scientifically, "upon the amount of
carbon the system has in reserve. Personally I think I can hold out a
little longer. I had an excellent breakfast this m----, the day we came
here. But if I felt a sinking----"

"_Waugh!_" said Mrs. Portheris.

"Have you--have you _begun_?" I exclaimed in agony, while Dicky shook in
silence.

"I have," replied Mrs. Portheris hurriedly; "where--where is the
eucalyptus? Ah! I have it!"

"_Ben-en-euh!_ It is nutritive, I am sure, but it requires a cordial."

The darkness for some reason seemed a little less black and the silence
less oppressive.

"I have only eaten about three inches," remarked Mrs. Portheris
presently. Dicky and I were incapable of conversation--"but I--but I
cannot go on at present. It is really not nice."

"An overdone flavour, hasn't it?" asked Dicky, between gasps.

"Very much so! Horribly! But the eucalyptus will, I hope, enable me to
extract some benefit from it. I think I'll lie down again." And we heard
the sound of a cork restored to its bottle as Mrs. Portheris returned to
the tomb. It was quite half an hour before she woke up, declaring that a
whole night had passed and that she was more famished th