I found him a few minutes later with his head buried in a sofa cushion. ’Oh, what a thing it is to have a corrugated relative!’ he gasped. ’Isn’t she a priceless female? And their clothes! I must write and tell daddy. How he would have enjoyed it.’ And then my brother suddenly turned serious in that funny way he has, and said,— ’But now, wasn’t she absolutely putrid, picking holes in everybody who differs in the least degree from herself. I hate that type of "Christian"; you ought to be able to judge Him by His followers, and half the time you can’t. Nasty, spiteful old cat, bet her husband wished he’d never married her after the first ten minutes. I don’t wonder he kicked the bucket at an early age.’ ’Well,’ I remarked in a pause, ’you aren’t exactly doing the charitable stunt yourself at the moment, are you?’ My brother looked at me lugubriously. ’_Isn’t_ it difficult?’ he exclaimed. ’Really, I wonder He doesn’t chuck me right out of The Service. I’m always letting Him down. Oh, clear out, Meg.’ So I cleared out, and as I passed the top of the back stairs I could see the staff standing on three chairs, craning their necks to catch the last glimpse of Keziah as she followed her mistress down the garden path. When the gate closed on the vision, the staff sighed deeply and said,—’Golly.’ Which seemed to exactly sum up the situation. ’Our Lady of Ventre’ remarked,— ’Give my inside quite a turn she did when she first come in the kitchen!’ Then I went in to Sam’s little sitting-room. ’I’ve come to have it out with you, Sam, sit down.’ ’Won’t hurt me to stand up for five minutes, miss.’ ’Sit down when you’re told. I’m going to stay hours. Put your leg up properly. Now then,’ I observed, when discipline had been unwillingly restored. ’We’ve had enough to eat since last Friday, have you been interfering in my kitchen, Brown?’ ’Sorry, miss, but he told me to, you know.’ ’Yes, but do you think that is sufficient reason when I told you not to. You must take a month’s notice,’ I said severely. ’Who’s the mistress of the house, Brown?’ ’You are, madam,’ and he twinkled at me. ’Well, now, as you are really respectful, I may feel inclined to withdraw the notice if you tell me exactly where I go wrong. Why are we so disliked, let’s have the whole truth, what’s the matter with us?’ ’Everything,’ said Sam, surveying me gloomily, ’but some things specially, the silver’s one.’ ’The silver? Why it’s almost all old, some of it’s seventeen hundred and something.’ ’Well, that’s what I’m telling you, miss; it’s battered in places, it isn’t embossed enough, even a bit of chasing would be better than nothing. And then your clothes——’ ’Well, they cost enough.’ ’Yes, but they don’t look it, then Master Ross——’ ’Well, he always looks clean, Sam.’ ’Looking clean don’t matter, miss, he should try to look rich; then your relatives—what’s the good of some of them having titles if you call them plain "father" and "aunt"?’