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a pugaree, which was bending over a mountain of portmanteau.

“Yes, that is the Master!” exclaimed Alice, joyously. “Is he not a dear old fellow? He is as broad as he is long, and as good as he is broad. I am sure he has come out to see me. Oh, I must run down and speak to him!”

“Certainly not, I forbid you to do any such thing. Do come away from the window. It’s such bad form to stare at people,” said Clare severely, while extricating herself with some difficulty from their coign of vantage. “I don’t know what this professor means by coming out to see you. It seems to me a very strange proceeding altogether.”

“Oh, no; I half expected him. He wrote last mail, and said he might be here any day, but I did not think he could get out so soon,—and here of all places in the world!”

“Why of course the coaches connect here with the railway, and most people come overland, so there is nothing so wonderful about it. I will send down my card by-and-by, and you can write a message on it, if you insist upon it; but do let the unfortunate man have his supper in peace first.”

Clare hereupon relapsed into the depths of the horsehair sofa, which treacherously offered a