cate in England just what pasties of nightingales' tongues,
and garlands of roses, indicated with the Romans,--effeminacy and
self-indulgence. The Huns and the Goths were knocking at their doors,
and Demos and the Debacle are knocking at ours. History repeats itself,
which is lamentable, for its amazing tendency to tell the same tale
again and again makes it a bore.

"I should like to know, by the way," he continues, "why English girls
get taller and taller, stronger and stronger, and are as the very palm
of the desert for vigor and force, whilst the English young man gets
smaller and smaller, slighter and slighter, and has the nerves of an old
maid and the habits of a valetudinarian. It is uncommonly droll; and, if
the disparity goes on increasing, the ladies will not only get the
franchise, but they will carry the male voter to the polling-place on
their shoulders."

"As the French women did their husbands out of some town that
surrendered in some war," said Boom, who was addicted to historical
illustration and never lost occasion to display it.

"They won't carry their _husbands_," murmurs Brandolin. "They'll drive
_them_, and carry somebody else."

"Will they have any husbands at all when they can do as they like?" says
Boom.

"Probably not," says Brandolin. "My dear boy, what an earthly paradise
awaits you when you shall be of mature age, and shall have seen us all
descend one by one into the tomb, with all our social prejudices and
antiquated ways!"

"I dare say he'll be a navvy in New Guinea by that time, and all his
acres here will be being let out by the state at a rack-rent which the
people will call free land," says the father, with a groan.

"Very possible, too," replies Brandolin.

The boy's eyes go thoughtfully towards the landscape beyond the windows,
the beautiful lawns, the smiling gardens, the rolling woods. A look of
resolution comes over his fair frank face.

"They shan't take our lands without a fight for it," he says, with a
flush on his cheeks.

"And the fight will be a fierce one," says Brandolin, with a sigh, "and
I am afraid it is in Mr. Gladstone's 'dim and distant future,'--that is
to say, very near at hand indeed."

"Well, I shall be ready," says the lad. Both his father and Brandolin
are silent, vaguely touched by the look of the gallant and gracious boy,
as he stands there with the sun in his brave blue eyes, and thinking of
the troubled time which will await his manhood in t