"Yes, I certainly think hospitality of some sort should be shown them," she is saying, with quite an excited flush on her dear old ugly face. "We cannot, of course, do much; but afternoon tea, now, and some pleasant people to meet them,--and strawberries,--and a little stroll round the gardens--eh? And, Penelope, you used to be a great hand at claret-cup in our dear father's time; and then there is tennis. I really think, you know, it might be done." She quite bridles with pleasure at the bare anticipation. To entertain once more,--again to welcome guests beneath the old roof! For many years a nightly game of patience has been the sole dissipation the Misses Blake have known, and here of late days they have been going hither and thither to dances and garden-parties, and have acknowledged to themselves secretly that the change is sweet. And now they are actually discussing the idea of indulging in wild festivities on their own part! Surely these children from Jerusalem have much to answer for! "Is there going to be a party _here_, Aunt Priscilla?" asks Kit with enlarged eyes. "Well, my dear, we are debating the possibilities of it,--just the pros and cons," says Miss Priscilla, precisely. "Your aunt Penelope agrees with me that some attention is due to those young men in Clonbree Barracks." "You are going to ask Captain Cobbett and Mr. Ryde here! Oh, what fun!" cries Kit, seating herself, minus invitation, on Miss Priscilla's knee, and twining her arms round her neck. "Do you know, when with mother we didn't dare call our souls our own; but with you we are having real good old times! Aren't we, now?" "Oh, Kit!--my _dear_ Kit!--you must not speak so of your lost mother," cry the old ladies in a breath, both greatly distressed. "Well, I shan't if you don't wish it; but it is true, for all that. And so you are really going to ask that big young man and his little captain to come here?" "Your Aunt Penelope and I both feel that some hospitality should be shown to Her Majesty," says Miss Priscilla, pompously. "The Queen!" says Kit aghast. "You aren't going to ask _her_ to Moyne are you? Windsor is a long way off, and she is pretty well on now, you know, and I don't believe she'd come." "Not personally. But we shall pay her the compliment through her trusty servants the marines. Not that we owe her much," says Miss Priscilla, shaking her head. "I cannot think she has behaved quite fairly towards us in many ways. Never coming to see us, I mean, or sending the prince, or having a residence here, or that----" "Still," breaks in Miss Penelope, coming to Her Majesty's relief, with the evident and kindly desire of showing her up in a more favorable light, "I have always understood that in private life she is a most exemplary woman,--a blameless wife so long as she was allowed to be so, and a most excellent mother."