ives on the
writing-table.

"It's I who bungled, the other day, when I suggested your giving Mrs
Polsue a duplicate list of the names and addresses. I thought it
would please her and save you half the secretarial labour; and now it
appears that you _like_ the secretarial labour!"

"What has happened?" Mrs Steele asked. "Well, young Obed Pearce rode
over to see me yesterday. He's in great distress of mind, poor
fellow; dying to enlist and serve his country, but held back by his
parents, who won't hear of it. As if this wasn't torture enough, in
the midst of it he gets an envelope by post--addressed in a feigned
hand, and with no letter inside, but just three white feathers."

"Oh, hateful! Who could be so wicked?"

"I met Lippity-Libby at the gate this morning. 'Look here,' I said;
'this is a pretty poison you are sowing on your rounds': and I showed
him the feathers which young Obed had left with me. 'I know you
can't help it,' said I, 'but if the Post Office can stop and open
suspected circulars, surely it can refuse to help this abomination!'
'I've delivered pretty well a score, sir,' said he; 'and I wish you
or some person would write to the papers and stop it.' 'Well,' I
said, 'it's not for me to ask if you have a guess who sends this sort
of thing about?' He rubbed his chin for a while and then answered:
`No, Parson; nor 'tisn't for me to tell 'ee if I do: but if you
_should_ happen to be strollin' down t'wards the Quay, you might take
a look at Mrs Polsue's Cochin-China hens. The way them birds have
been moultin' since the War started--'"

"Robert! You don't tell me that woman plucks the poor things alive!"

"Ay: and takes the bleeding quills to draw more blood from young
men's hearts."

CHAPTER XIX.

I-SPY-HI!

At certain decent and regular intervals of time (we need not indicate
them more precisely) Mrs Polsue was accustomed to order in from the
Three Pilchards a firkin of ale. A firkin, as the reader probably
knows, is the least compromising of casks, and Mr Latter regularly
attended in person to "spile" it. Mrs Polsue as regularly took care
to watch the operation.

"The newspaper tells me," said she, "that this is likely to be a
teetotal War."

"Tell me another, ma'am!" answered Mr Latter in his unconventional
way.

"It would be an excellent thing for our troops in the field: and, if
you ask my opinion, a little mortifying of the spirit would do the
working classes of this