in the clear noon of this winter day was that each one carried in her arms an infant.  And each one, as she reached the place where the enthralled BONDUCA sat obliviscent of her sheep, stopped for a moment and laid the baby down.  First came the Duchess of HAMPTONSHIRE followed at an interval by Lady MOTTISFONT and the Marchioness of STONEHENGE.  To them succeeded BARBARA of the House of GREBE, Lady ICENWAY and Squire PETRICK’s lady.  Next followed the Countess of WESSEX, the Honourable LAURA and the Lady PENELOPE.  ANNA, Lady BAXBY, brought up the rear.

BONDUCA shuddered at the terrible rencounter.  Was her young life to be surrounded with infants?  She was not a baby-farm after all, and the audition of these squalling nurslings vexed her.  What could the matter mean?  No answer was given to these questionings.  A man’s figure, vast and terrible, appeared on the hill’s brow, with a cruel look of triumph on his wicked face.  It was THOMAS TATTERS.  BONDUCA cowered; the noble dames fled shrieking down the valley.

“Bo,” said he, “my own sweet Bo, behold the blood-red ray in the spectrum of your young life.”

“Say those words quickly,” she retorted.

“Certainly,” said TATTERS.  “Blood-red ray, Broo-red ray, Broo-re-ray, Brooray!  Tush!” he broke off, vexed with BONDUCA and his own imperfect tongue-power, “you are fooling me.  Beware!”

“I know you, I know you!” was all she could gasp, as she bowed herself submissive before him.  “I detest you, and shall therefore marry you.  Trample upon me!” And he trampled upon her.

CHAPTER V.

Thus BO PEEP lost her sheep, leaving these fleecy tail-bearers to come home solitary to the accustomed fold.  She did but humble herself before the manifestation of a Wessex necessity.

And Fate, sitting aloft in the careless expanse of ether rolled her destined chariots thundering along the pre-ordained highways of heaven, crushing a soul here and a life there with the tragic completeness of a steam-roller, granite-smashing, steam-fed, irresistible.  And butter was churned with a twang in it, and rustics danced, and sheep that had fed in clover were “blasted,” like poor BONDUCA’s budding prospects.  And, from the calm nonchalance of a Wessex hamlet, another novel was launched into a world of reviews, where the multitude of readers is not as to their external displacements, but as to their subjective experiences.

[THE END.

* * * * *

THE NEW GALLERY.

This is the place to see the “female form divine” of all shapes and sizes.  Walk up, walk up, and look at a few of the young Ladies:—­

No. 13. “White Roses.” E.J.  POYNTER, R.A.  Thorns here, evidently, judging by the young woman’s look of anguish.  And this is the moral POYNTER points.

No. 66. “A War Cloud.” A Music-HALLE singing “Rule Britannia!” with proper dressings.