tale would it be to tell, that untold story of woman's wrongs and un-unrequited love!"

"Ookedookedoo, there's a treat in store for you, young man," said Mr. Punch, skipping by. "Will you

have my ruffles to dry your tears? Go it, old girl." And away he went, leaving Laura speechless from indignation. He went on to where the Prince was standing, and tapped him on the shoulder.

"Where do you come from, you strange little man?" said Lady Marjory.

"There are many strange things to be seen tonight,” said Punch, mysteriously hissing out his words. "There's a little peasant girl fainting and dying in the moonlight; she was coming to find her love, and he spurned her; and there is an old gentleman trying to bring her to life. Her heart is breaking, and he wants blood to anoint it, he says,-princely blood-shed in the moonlight, drop by drop from a false heart, and it is for you to choose the time and the place. have to find another cavalier, and will

This lady will

she like him,

Prince, with fool's cap and bells, and a hump before and behind? In that case," says Mr. Punch, with a caper, "I am her very humble servant.

Lady Marjory did not answer, but looked very haughty, as fashionable young ladies do, and Mr. Punch vanished in an instant.

she.

"I hope I shall never see that person again," said "The forwardness of common people is really Of course he was talking nonsense.

unbearable.

Little Prince, would you kindly hold my muff while I tie my bonnet-strings more securely?"

The Prince took the muff without speaking, and then dropped it on the floor unconsciously. Now at last he saw clearly, in an instant it was all plain to him; he was half distracted with shame and remorse. There was a vision before his eyes of his little peasant maiden -loved so fondly, and, alas! wantonly abandoned and cruelly deserted-cold and pale and dying down below in the moonlight. He could not bear the thought; he caught Lady Marjory by the hand.

Come," said he, "oh, come. I am a wretch, a wretch! Oh, I thought she had deceived me. Oh, come, come! Oh, my little peasant maiden. Oh, how I loved her!".

Lady Marjory drew herself up. "You may go, Prince, wherever you may wish," she said, looking at him with her great round eyes, "but pray go alone; I do not choose to meet that man again. I will wait for you here, and you can tell me your story when you come back." Lady Marjory, generous and kind-hearted as she was, could not but be hurt at the way in which, as it seemed, she too had been deceived, nor was she used to being thrown over for little peasant maidens.

The little Prince with a scared face looked round the room for some one with whom to leave her, but no one showed at that instant, and so, half-bewildered still and dreaming, he rushed away.

Only a minute before the old gentleman had said to

Punchinello, "Let us carry the little girl out upon the balcony, the fresh air may revive her." And so it happened that the little Prince came to the very landing where they had waited so long, and found no signs of those for whom he was looking.

He ran about desperately, everywhere asking for news, but no one had any to give him. Who ever has? He passed the window a dozen times without thinking of looking out. Blind, deaf, insensible, are we not all to our dearest friend outside a door? to the familiar voice which is calling for us across a street? to the kind heart which is longing for us behind a plaster wall maybe. Blind, insensible indeed, and alone; oh, how alone! He first asked two ladies who came tottering upstairs, helplessly on little feet, with large open parasols, though it was in the middle of the night. One of them was smelling at a great flower with a straight stalk, the other fanning herself with a dried lotus-leaf; but they shook their heads idiotically, and answered something in their own language-one of those sentences on the tea-caddies, most likely. These were Chinese ladies from the great jar in the drawingThen he met a beautiful little group of Dresden china children, pelting each other with flowers off the chintz chairs and sofas, but they laughed and danced on, and did not even stop to answer his questions. Then came a long procession of persons all dressed in black and white, walking sedately, running, sliding up the banisters, riding donkeys, on horses, in carriages,

room.

pony-chaises, omnibuses, bathing-machines; old ladies with bundles, huge umbrellas, and band-boxes; old gentlemen with big waistcoats; red-nosed gentlemen; bald gentlemen, muddled, puzzled, bewildered, perplexed, indignant. Young ladies, dark-eyed, smiling, tripping and dancing in hats and feathers, curls blowing in the wind, in ball-dresses, in pretty morning costumes; schoolboys with apple cheeks; little girls, babies, pretty servant-maids; gigantic footmen (marching in a corps); pages walking on their heads after their mistresses, chasing Scotch terriers, smashing, crashing, larking, covered with buttons.

"What is this crowd of phantoms, the ghosts of yesterday, and last week ?"

"We are all the people out of Mr. Leech's picturebooks," says an old gentleman in a plaid shootingcostume; my own name is Briggs, sir; I am sorry I can give you no further information.”

Any other time, and the little Prince must have been amused to see them go by, but to-night he rushes on despairingly; he only sees the little girl's pale face and dying eyes gleaming through the darkness. More Dresden, more Chinese; strange birds whirr past, a partridge scrambles by with her little ones. Gilt figures climb about the cornices and furniture; the bookcases are swarming with busy little people; the little gold cupid comes down off the clock, and looks at himself in the looking-glass. A hundred minor personages pass by, dancing, whirling in bewildering circles.

On

the walls the papering turns into a fragrant bower of creeping flowers; all the water-colour landscapes come to life. Rain beats, showers fall, clouds drift, light warms and streams, water deepens, wavelets swell and plash tranquilly on the shores. Ships begin to sail, sails fill, and away they go gliding across the lake-like waters so beautifully that I cannot help describing it, though all this, I know, is of quite common occurrence and has been often written about before. The little Prince, indeed, paid no attention to all that was going on, but went and threw himself down before the purple bank, and vowed with despair in his heart he would wait there until his little peasant maiden should come again.

There Laura saw him sitting on a stool, with his fair hair all dishevelled, and his arms hanging wearily. She had come back to look for one of her pearl earrings, and when she had discovered it, thought it would be but frindly to cheer the Prince up a bit, and, accordingly, tapped him facetiously on the shoulder, and declared she should tell Lady Marjory of him. "Waiting there for the little peasant child; oh, you naughty fickle creature!" said she, playfully.

You have made mischief enough for one night. Go!" said the Prince, looking her full in the face with his wan wild eyes, so that Laura shrank away a little abashed, and then he turned his back upon her, and hid his face in his hands.

So the sprightly Laura, finding that there was no one to talk to her, frisked up into the study again,