Poor little Johnny looked from one to the other, utterly bewildered. The sight of his whole family simultaneously in tears was too much for him, and, lifting up his voice, he gave vent to his feelings in a volume of sound which left no doubt as to the unimpaired condition of his lungs even after a night under the stars. Jim Fry had been circling round the group scratching his head, rubbing his nose, and screwing up his mouth in token of dissatisfaction. At this juncture he thought it was time to interfere. “Well, I never,” he remarked irritably, “I never did see sich folk. Here we’ve all been a-trapesing over the county lookin’ for the child, and thinkin’ him dead or stole, or hurted some way; and now we’ve a-found en safe and sound, wi’out so much as a scratch on en, and ye must all begin a-cryin’ and a-sobbin’ enough to frighten en out of his wits. ’Tisn’t what ye’d like, be it, Johnny?” “No,” said Johnny, with such a heave of his little chest that it very nearly lifted him out of his father’s arms. Again he looked from one to the other with tearful, bewildered eyes, and again the sense of his injuries was too much for him. “I’d like—summat—to eat!” he announced in a bellow of wrath and woe. And thereupon the whole simple family fell a-laughing; and once again Johnny was hugged all round, and though eyes were still wet, and every now and then there would be a little catch in the voice of one or other speaker, the general equanimity was restored, and the party fell to discussing the little boy’s practical suggestion. It was a very happy family that presently sat down to breakfast in a neighbouring cottage, Johnny being handed with respectful tenderness from one to the other, and being disposed before the meal was out to look upon himself quite in the light of a hero. And Maggie sat between her father and Jim Fry, and was perhaps the happiest of all. THE ROUT OF THE CONQUEROR. THE log fire burnt cheerily on the wide hearth, hissing and crackling every now and then, and sending showers of sparks dancing up the chimney; casting flickering shadows on the low ceiling, and sportively throwing little dots and rims of light from one to the other of Betty Sibley’s cherished treasures of crockery ware. But Betty herself looked very serious as she sat leaning forward in her arm-chair, her bony elbows resting on her knees, her pointed chin supported by her hands, her beady black eyes roving from one to the other of her two visitors.