t the
Aylesbury Grinds--"

Miss Limpenny, who did not know an Aylesbury Grind from a Bampton
Lecture, yet detected an unfamiliar ring in the Vicar's voice.

"He fought a welsher," pursued the Vicar, "just before riding in a
race. 'Rollingstone,' his horse was, and Cheddar's eyes closed
before the second fence. 'Tom,' he called to me--I was on a mare
called Barmaid--"

I ask you to guess the amazement that fell among us. He--our Vicar--
riding a mare called Barmaid! Miss Limpenny cast her eyes up to meet
the descent of the thunderbolt.

"Lord Ballarat was riding too," the Vicar went on, "and young Tom
Beauchamp, son of the Bishop--"

"Died of D.T. out at Malta with the Ninety-ninth," interpolated the
Honourable Frederic.

"So I heard, poor fellow. Three-bottle Beauchamp we called him.
I've put him to bed many a time when--"

It was too much.

"In the Great Exhibition of 1851," began Miss Priscilla severely.

But at this moment a dreadful rumbling shook the room. The
chandeliers rattled, the egg-shell china danced upon the what-not,
and a jarring sensation suddenly ran up the spine of every person in
the company.

"It's an earthquake!" shouted the Honourable Frederic, starting up
with an oath.

Miss Limpenny thought an earthquake nothing less than might be
expected after such language. Louder and still louder grew the
rumbling, until the very walls shook. Everybody turned to a ghastly
white. The Vicar's face bore eloquent witness to the reproach of his
conscience.

"I think it must be thunder," he gasped.

"Or a landslip," suggested Sam Buzza.

"Or a paroxysm of Nature," said Mr. Moggridge (though nobody knew
what he meant).

"Or the end of the world," hazarded Mr. Goodwyn-Sandys.

"I beg your pardon," interposed Mrs. Buzza timidly, "but I think it
may be my husband."

"Is your husband a volcano, madam?" snapped Mr. Goodwyn-Sandys,
rather sharply.

Mrs. Buzza might have answered "Yes," with some colour of truth; but
she merely said, "I think it must be his double-bass. My husband is
apt in hours of depression to seek the consolation of that
instrument."

"But, my dear madam, what is the tune?"

"I think," she faltered, "I am not sure, but I rather think, it is
the 'Dead March' in _Saul_."

There was no doubt of it. The notes by this time vibrated piteously
through the party-wall, and with their awful solemnity triumphed over
all conversation. Tones became hushed, as though in th