"They _did_ have five separate weighings," the Captain said, "but--Well, it beats _me_ entirely!" he added, in a sudden burst of candour. "Here's the result. First and second sack weighed twelve pounds; second and third, thirteen and a half; third and fourth, eleven and a half; fourth and fifth, eight: and then they say they had only the large hammer left, and it took _three_ sacks to weigh it down--that's the first, third and fifth--and _they_ weighed sixteen pounds. There, gentlemen! Did you ever hear anything like _that_?" The old man muttered under his breath "If only my sister were here!" and looked helplessly at his son. His son looked at the five natives. The five natives looked at the Captain. The Captain looked at nobody: his eyes were cast down, and he seemed to be saying softly to himself "Contemplate one another, gentlemen, if such be your good pleasure. _I_ contemplate _Myself_!" KNOT V. OUGHTS AND CROSSES. "Look here, upon this picture, and on this." "And what made you choose the first train, Goosey?" said Mad Mathesis, as they got into the cab. "Couldn't you count better than _that_?" "I took an extreme case," was the tearful reply. "Our excellent preceptress always says 'When in doubt, my dears, take an extreme case.' And I _was_ in doubt." "Does it always succeed?" her aunt enquired. Clara sighed. "Not _always_," she reluctantly admitted. "And I can't make out why. One day she was telling the little girls--they make such a noise at tea, you know--'The more noise you make, the less jam you will have, and _vice versâ_.' And I thought they wouldn't know what '_vice versâ_' meant: so I explained it to them. I said 'If you make an infinite noise, you'll get no jam: and if you make no noise, you'll get an infinite lot of jam.' But our excellent preceptress said that wasn't a good instance. _Why_ wasn't it?" she added plaintively. Her aunt evaded the question. "One sees certain objections to it," she said. "But how did you work it with the Metropolitan trains? None of them go infinitely fast, I believe." "I called them hares and tortoises," Clara said--a little timidly, for she dreaded being laughed at. "And I thought there couldn't be so many hares as tortoises on the Line: so I took an extreme case--one hare and an infinite number of tortoises." "An extreme case, indeed," her aunt remarked with admirable gravity: "and a most dangerous state of things!" "And I thought, if I went with a tortoise, there would be only _one_ hare to meet: but if I went with the hare--you know there were _crowds_ of tortoises!" "It wasn't a bad idea," said the elder lady, as they left the cab, at the entrance of Burlington House. "You shall have another chance to-day. We'll have a match in marking pictures." Clara brightened up. "I should like to try again, very much," she said. "I'll take more care this time. How are we to play?"