"Mr. Jarge Double-ye Walker, I ax your pardon for shpeakin' so rough to ye, sor. 'Tis ahl past and gone now, sor, and I bear ye no ill-will." Then to the president he said, quietly, "Thank you kindly, Mr. Prisidint;" and taking his hat, moved back among those who were standing near the door. Mr. Cutting now moved that we proceed to the election of officers for the ensuing year. The motion was carried. When the ballots were counted, it was found that the existing officers had received the votes of twenty-seven thousand and some odd shares, thus having a clear majority. We could, of course, tell exactly how many votes were due to O'Connor's proxies; but how many more were due to his personal presence at the meeting, we could only estimate. THE SHIP OF STARS By A. T. Quiller-Couch (Q.) XVIII THE BARRIERS FALL There were marks of teeth on his right boot, but no marks at all on his body. Fright—or fright following on that evening's frenzy—had killed him. He was buried three days later, and Mr. Raymond read the service. No rain had fallen, and the blood of the three hounds still stained the gravel dividing the grave from the porch, where the crowd had shot them down. For awhile his death made small difference to the family at the Parsonage. They had fought the shadow of his enmity and proved it for what it was; a shadow and little else. But they had scarcely realized their success, and wondered why the removal of the shadow did not affect them more. About this time Taffy began to carry out a scheme which he and his father had often discussed, but hitherto had found no leisure for—the setting up of wooden crosses on the graves of the drowned sailormen. They had wished for slate: but good slate was expensive and hard to come by, and Taffy had no skill in stone-cutting. Since wood it must be, he resolved to put his best work into it. The names, etc., should be engraved, not painted merely. Some of the pew-fronts in the church had panels elaborately carved in flat and shallow relief—fine Jacobean designs, all of them. He took careful rubbings of the narrowest, made tracings, and set to work to copy them on the face of his crosses. One afternoon, some three weeks after the Squire's funeral, he happened to return to the house for a tracing which he had forgotten, and found Honoria seated in the kitchen and talking with his father and mother. She was dressed in black, of course, and either this or the solemnity of her visit gave her quite a grown-up look. But to be sure, she was mistress of Tredinnis now, and a child no longer. Taffy guessed the meaning of her visit at once. And no doubt this act of formal reconciliation between Tredinnis House and the Parsonage had cost her some nervousness. When he entered his parents stood up and seemed just as awkward as their visitor. "Another time, perhaps," he heard his father say. Honoria rose almost at once, and would not stay to drink tea, though Humility pressed her.