"Oh! nothing much; only he wouldn't eat his dinner just now because it was only an egg, and the others had mutton. He really is too young to have meat every day; so, as I was busy, I told nurse to put him to bed, and he is sitting up in it making the most unearthly noises, as if the whole farmyard were in the top landing. Listen! you can hear him down here." There could be no doubt of it, and as they stood in the hall, looking up involuntarily, a perfect babel of cluckings and cacklings, crowings and quackings, seemed to come down the stairs with Mary, the nursemaid, who was bearing the dirty dishes from the nursery dinner; among them Blazes' despised egg. "The worst of it is," went on Lady George, in her high, plaintive voice, "you never really know what the child means. Why, for instance, should he cackle, as if he had laid an egg himself?" '"Um!" grumbled her husband. "More to the purpose why he refused his dinner? Here, let me look at that tray, will you? By Jove, Blanche!" he went on, holding out the egg-cup excitedly, "it's bad--no child could be expected to eat that--what a fool!" He was half-way up the stairs impetuously when his wife begged him to be discreet, and wait for her. "It is just what I said," she confided to Paul, who followed full of laughter. "You never can tell what he means till afterwards; now, of course, I can guess that--that----" She paused, feeling that words were unnecessary before the spectacle of Blasius, standing beside the round, white pillow of his cot, and cackling vehemently. But Lord George was too angry for amusement, and after an elaborate apology to Blazes for the mistake, handed him over to the nurse with a sharp order to re-dress him and take more care in future, which enabled that functionary to veil her real regret under a show of indignation until Blasius, who was sitting on her knee, and could presumably see more of the truths than others, said consolingly: "Never mind, nursie! Cocky eat his own egg next time." Whereupon, she burst into tears and hugged him for a darling, and a treasure, and the one comfort of her life. "I don't think his meaning was obscure that time, Blanche," said her husband, as they went downstairs. "If Cocky had committed the indiscretion of laying a bad egg, why then--God bless the boy, he is a little trump!" "And has a wisdom beyond his years," added Paul, rather cynically; "for he lays the blame where it should be given--on the Creator." "My dear Paul! what a dreadful thing to say; please remember he is your god-son." "Well, if he doesn't hear it from me he will from others, my dear girl," replied her brother, with a shrug of the shoulders. "It is the teaching of to-day. We are none of us responsible beings." "And upon my soul," growled Lord George, "I'm inclined to agree with it in one sense--think of that fool of a nurse!--you should dismiss her, Blanche."