s the Carthaginians; do you,
Mr. Frere?"

Maurice, somewhat staggered by this question, could only ask, "Why not?"

"Well, I don't like them half so well myself," says Sylvia, with
feminine disdain of reasons. "They always had so many soldiers, though
the others were so cruel when they conquered."

"Were they?" says Frere.

"Were they! Goodness gracious, yes! Didn't they cut poor Regulus's
eyelids off, and roll him down hill in a barrel full of nails? What do
you call that, I should like to know?" and Mr. Frere, shaking his red
head with vast assumption of classical learning, could not but concede
that that was not kind on the part of the Carthaginians.

"You are a great scholar, Miss Sylvia," he remarked, with a
consciousness that this self-possessed girl was rapidly taking him out
of his depth.

"Are you fond of reading?"

"Very."

"And what books do you read?"

"Oh, lots! 'Paul and Virginia', and 'Paradise Lost', and 'Shakespeare's
Plays', and 'Robinson Crusoe', and 'Blair's Sermons', and 'The Tasmanian
Almanack', and 'The Book of Beauty', and 'Tom Jones'."

"A somewhat miscellaneous collection, I fear," said Mrs. Vickers, with a
sickly smile--she, like Gallio, cared for none of these things--"but
our little library is necessarily limited, and I am not a great reader.
John, my dear, Mr. Frere would like another glass of brandy-and-water.
Oh, don't apologize; I am a soldier's wife, you know. Sylvia, my love,
say good-night to Mr. Frere, and retire."

"Good-night, Miss Sylvia. Will you give me a kiss?"

"No!"

"Sylvia, don't be rude!"

"I'm not rude," cries Sylvia, indignant at the way in which her literary
confidence had been received. "He's rude! I won't kiss you. Kiss you
indeed! My goodness gracious!"

"Won't you, you little beauty?" cried Frere, suddenly leaning forward,
and putting his arm round the child. "Then I must kiss you!"

To his astonishment, Sylvia, finding herself thus seized and kissed
despite herself, flushed scarlet, and, lifting up her tiny fist, struck
him on the cheek with all her force.

The blow was so sudden, and the momentary pain so sharp, that Maurice
nearly slipped into his native coarseness, and rapped out an oath.

"My dear Sylvia!" cried Vickers, in tones of grave reproof.

But Frere laughed, caught both the child's hands in one of his own, and
kissed her again and again, despite her struggles. "There!" he said,
with a sort of triumph in his tone. "You got nothi