"Thought you were a bit keen, you know--she's not at all bad for a sister, is she?" "Rather not!" said John ecstatically, giving his bow a confirmatory pull. That evening John knew Mr. Ribble much more intimately, for while one of Vernley's sisters was accompanying the aspiring prima donna, John was led off by the politician into the conservatory. The boy began asking questions about the House of Commons and Mr. Ribble had a great fund of stories. John learned of Mr. Balfour's aloof manner, Mr. Churchill's imperturbable genius, Mr. Lloyd George's subtlety, Mr. Asquith's classic weight and Sir Henry Campbell Bannerman's personal charm; then he wished to know all about Mr. Austen Chamberlain and the hereditary monocle, whether Mr. John Burn's mother really had been a washerwoman, and what tactics were legitimate in catching the Speaker's eye. Leaving these personalities, the conversation changed to political economy and John found himself on new ground and in a world of unknown names. John felt flattered by the fact that Mr. Ribble took it for granted that he knew these persons and subjects, but the politician was deliberately whetting the boy's appetite and trying to lead him into a channel of serious study. John Stuart Mill, Walter Bagehot, Edmund Burke, Karl Marx, together with such queer names as Spinoza, Kant, Schlegel, Schopenhauer and Nietzsche, all rolled off Mr. Ribble's tongue. He was now in the realm of Philosophy, and John, for the first time in his life, heard of Comte and Positivism, of Darwin and the Origin of Species, of Huxley and Russell Wallace. Mr. Ribble talked and John listened, experiencing the wonderful thrill as when Mr. Steer had shown him the world of poetry. "I think you had better start with Ruskin's 'Unto This Last,'" said Mr. Ribble when John asked where he should begin. "He's easy to read and somewhat superficial. You'll find that philosophy and political economy are closely related--half brothers in fact, and Ruskin believes their parents were Social Morality and Private Duty." Before going to bed that night, John had found a copy of "Unto This Last" which he took up to bed. The two boys often read before going to sleep, and Vernley was engrossed in "Kim" so that he did not see what absorbed John, until growing sleepy, he closed his book and came into John's room with its light still burning. "What are you reading?" he asked. "Ruskin," replied John, deep in the book. "Golly--what on earth are you reading that piffle for--what's the book?" "Unto This Last." "Holy Moses--you're the queerest mixture I've ever known. Last hols it was "Whose dwelling is--"