"Why, what ever is the matter with you?" he demanded. "Are you goin' to bust yourself wi' larfin', by way of gettin' a happetite for the breakfast that you hain't no prospect of?" To this Stumpy replied by pulling from his trousers pocket four shining pennies, which he held out with an air of triumph. "Oh!" exclaimed Owlet; and then being unable to find words sufficiently expressive, he rubbed the place where the front of his waistcoat would have been if he had possessed one. "Yes," said Stumpy, regarding the coppers with a pensive air, "I've slep' with you all night in my 'and, an' my 'and in my pocket, an' my knees doubled up to my chin to make all snug, an' now I'm going to have a tuck in--a blow out--a buster--a--" He paused abruptly, and looking with a gleeful air at his companion, said-- "But that wasn't what I was laughin' at." "Well, I suppose it warn't. What was it, then?" The boy's eyes sparkled again, and for some moments a half-suppressed chuckling prevented speech. "It was a dream," he said at last. "A dream!" exclaimed Owlet contemptuously. "I hate dreams. When I dreams 'em they're always about bobbies and maginstrates, an' wittles, an' when other fellows tells about 'em they're so long-winded an' prosy. But I had a dream too. What was yours?" "My dream was about a bobby," returned his friend. "See, here it is, an' I won't be long-winded or prosy, Howlet, so don't growl and spoil your happetite for that 'ere breakfast that's a-comin'. I dreamed--let me see, was it in Piccadilly--no, it was Oxford Street, close by Regent Street, where all the swells go to promynade, you know. Well, I sees a bobby--of course I never can go the length my little toe without seein' a bobby! but this bobby was a stunner. You never see'd sitch a feller. Not that he was big, or fierce, but he had a nose just two-foot-six long. I know for certain, for I'm a good judge o' size, besides, I went straight up to him, as bold as brass, and axed him how long it was, an' he told me without winkin'. The strange thing about it is that I wasn't a bit surprised at his nose. Wery odd, ain't it, eh, Howlet, that people never is surprised at anything they sees in dreams? I do b'lieve, now, if I was to see a man takin' a walk of a' arternoon with his head in his coat-tail pocket I'd take it quite as a matter of course.