the stages as well. They were approaching Swindon. The coach
was travelling at a dizzy speed--six miles in the last half-hour--when,
without having manifested the slightest premonitory symptom of
unsteadiness, Sir Ferdinando suddenly toppled sideways off his seat
and fell, head foremost, into the road. An unpleasant jolt awakened the
slumbering passengers. The coach was brought to a standstill; the
guard ran back with a light. He found Sir Ferdinando still alive, but
unconscious; blood was oozing from his mouth. The back wheels of the
coach had passed over his body, breaking most of his ribs and both arms.
His skull was fractured in two places. They picked him up, but he was
dead before they reached the next stage. So perished Sir Ferdinando,
a victim to his own patriotism. Lady Lapith did not marry again, but
determined to devote the rest of her life to the well-being of her three
children--Georgiana, now five years old, and Emmeline and Caroline,
twins of two."

Henry Wimbush paused, and once more put on his pince-nez. "So much
by way of introduction," he said. "Now I can begin to read about my
grandfather."

"One moment," said Mr. Scogan, "till I've refilled my pipe."

Mr. Wimbush waited. Seated apart in a corner of the room, Ivor was
showing Mary his sketches of Spirit Life. They spoke together in
whispers.

Mr. Scogan had lighted his pipe again. "Fire away," he said.

Henry Wimbush fired away.

"It was in the spring of 1833 that my grandfather, George Wimbush, first
made the acquaintance of the 'three lovely Lapiths,' as they were always
called. He was then a young man of twenty-two, with curly yellow hair
and a smooth pink face that was the mirror of his youthful and ingenuous
mind. He had been educated at Harrow and Christ Church, he enjoyed
hunting and all other field sports, and, though his circumstances were
comfortable to the verge of affluence, his pleasures were temperate and
innocent. His father, an East Indian merchant, had destined him for a
political career, and had gone to considerable expense in acquiring a
pleasant little Cornish borough as a twenty-first birthday gift for his
son. He was justly indignant when, on the very eve of George's majority,
the Reform Bill of 1832 swept the borough out of existence. The
inauguration of George's political career had to be postponed. At the
time he got to know the lovely Lapiths he was waiting; he was not at all
impatient.

"The lovely Lapiths did not