them, and the crouching occupants of
the trench heard it hit the ground a few yards away. Then it burst
with a deafening roar: a roar which was followed by an ominous creaking.

It was the phlegmatic Sapper--the base materialist--who broke the news
first.

With an expression of great relief on his face he gazed over the top of
the trench. "Thank 'Eavens! you can't make a sixteenth, mate. The
whole plurry tree's nah poo."

"Nah poo," murmured Bendigo Jones. "Nah poo. What is nah poo?" He
stood up and peered over the top also. "I see no change. To some eyes
it might seem that the tree had fallen; to mine it lives for
ever--fragrant and cool." He descended and trod heavily on the
General's toe. "To you, sir, as a man of understanding, I give my
morning's labours. I have rechristened it. It symbolises 'Children at
play in Epping Forest.'"

Magnificently he thrust the lump of disintegrating dirt into the arms
of his outraged superior. "It is yours, sir; I, Bendigo Jones, have
given you my masterpiece."

Then he departed.

* * * * * *

The only man who really suffered was the base materialist. Two hours
later he rolled up for his dinner, in a mood even more uncommunicative
than usual.

"'Ullo, Nobby," remarked the cook affably, "you don't seem yer usual
chatty self this morning. An' wot 'ave you got on your neck?"

"Less of it," returned the other morosely. "It's Hepping Forest. And
that"--he plucked a fragment from his hair--"that is the bally twins
playin' ''Unt the slipper.'"

Even the cook was stirred out of his usual air of superiority by this
assertion, and contemplated the speaker with interest. "You don't
say." He inspected the phenomenon more closely. "I thought as 'ow it
was mud."

"It is." Nobby was even more morose. "It belonged to that 'orror
Bendigo Jones, and 'e went and give it to the General." The speaker
swallowed once or twice. "Then the General, 'e gives it back, in a
manner of speaking. Only Bendy had gone by the time it come, and--I
'adn't. Lumme! wot a life."

VIII

THE SONG OF THE BAYONET

Two men were seated at a table in a restaurant. Dinner was over, and
from all around them came the murmur of complacent and well-fed London.
A string band of just sufficient strength gave forth a ragtime effort;
a supreme being hovered near to ensure that the '65 brandy was all it
should be. Of the men themselves little need be said