Alice was knitting by the fire; it was for Father, but I am sure his feet are not at all that shape. He has a high and beautifully formed instep like Oswald's. Noel was writing poetry, of course. "My dear sister sits And knits, I hope to goodness the stocking fits," was as far as he had got. "It ought to be 'my dearest sister' to sound right," he said, "but that wouldn't be kind to Dora." "Thank you," said Dora, "You needn't trouble to be kind to me, if you don't want to." "Shut up, Dora!" said Dicky, "Noel didn't mean anything." "He never does," said H.O., "nor yet his poetry doesn't neither." "_And_ his poetry doesn't _either_," Dora corrected; "and besides, you oughtn't to say that at all, it's unkind----" "You're too jolly down on the kid," said Dicky. And Alice said, "Eighty-seven, eighty-eight--oh, do be quiet half a sec.!--eighty-nine, ninety--now I shall have to count the stitches all over again!" Oswald alone was silent and not cross. I tell you this to show that the sort of worryingness was among us that is catching, like measles. Kipling calls it the cameelious hump, and, as usual, that great and good writer is quite correct. So Oswald said, "Look here, let's have a council. It says in Kipling's book when you've got the hump go and dig till you gently perspire. Well, we can't do that, because it's simply pouring, but----" The others all interrupted him, and said they hadn't got the hump and they didn't know what he meant. So he shrugged his shoulders patiently (it is not his fault that the others hate him to shrug his shoulders patiently) and he said no more. Then Dora said, "Oh, don't be so disagreeable, Oswald, for goodness' sake!" I assure you she did, though he had done simply nothing. Matters were in this cryptical state when the door opened and Father came in. "Hullo, kiddies!" he remarked kindly. "Beastly wet day, isn't it? And dark too. I can't think why the rain can't always come in term time. It seems a poor arrangement to have it in 'vac.,' doesn't it?" I think every one instantly felt better. I know one of us did, and it was me. Father lit the gas, and sat down in the armchair and took Alice on his knee. "First," he said, "here is a box of chocs." It was an extra big and beautiful one and Fuller's best. "And besides the chocs., a piece of good news! You're all asked to a party at Mrs. Leslie's. She's going to have all sorts of games and things, with prizes for every one, and a conjurer and a magic lantern." The shadow of doom seemed to be lifted from each young brow, and we felt how much fonder we were of each other than any one would have thought. At least Oswald felt this, and Dicky told me afterwards he felt Dora wasn't such a bad sort after all.