anxiety that was somehow not offensive, "I do
advise you. You'd really better."

Ansell swallowed a little blood. He tried to move, and he could not.
He looked carefully into the young man's eyes and into the palm of his
right hand, which at present swung unclenched, and he said "Pax!"

"Shake hands!" said the other, helping him up. There was nothing Ansell
loathed so much as the hearty Britisher; but he shook hands, and they
stared at each other awkwardly. With civil murmurs they picked the
little blue flowers off each other's clothes. Ansell was trying to
remember why they had quarrelled, and the young man was wondering why he
had not guarded his chin properly. In the distance a hymn swung off--

"Fight the good. Fight with. All thy. Might."

They would be across from the chapel soon.

"Your book, sir?"

"Thank you, sir--yes."

"Why!" cried the young man--"why, it's 'What We Want'! At least the
binding's exactly the same."

"It's called 'Essays,'" said Ansell.

"Then that's it. Mrs. Failing, you see, she wouldn't call it that,
because three W's, you see, in a row, she said, are vulgar, and sound
like Tolstoy, if you've heard of him."

Ansell confessed to an acquaintance, and then said, "Do you think 'What
We Want' vulgar?" He was not at all interested, but he desired to escape
from the atmosphere of pugilistic courtesy, more painful to him than
blows themselves.

"It IS the same book," said the other--"same title, same binding." He
weighed it like a brick in his muddy hands.

"Open it to see if the inside corresponds," said Ansell, swallowing a
laugh and a little more blood with it.

With a liberal allowance of thumb-marks, he turned the pages over and
read, "'the rural silence that is not a poet's luxury but a practical
need for all men.' Yes, it is the same book." Smiling pleasantly over
the discovery, he handed it back to the owner.

"And is it true?"

"I beg your pardon?"

"Is it true that rural silence is a practical need?"

"Don't ask me!"

"Have you ever tried it?"

"What?"

"Rural silence."

"A field with no noise in it, I suppose you mean. I don't understand."

Ansell smiled, but a slight fire in the man's eye checked him. After
all, this was a person who could knock one down. Moreover, there was no
reason why he should be teased. He had it in him to retort "No. Why?"
He was not stupid in essentials. He was irritable--in Ansell's eyes a
frequent sign of grace. Sitting down on th