And now I must record an experience so strange, that I think it only fair, before beginning to relate it, to release my much-enduring reader from any obligation he may feel to believe this part of my story. I would not have believed it, I freely confess, if I had not seen it with my own eyes: then why should I expect it of my reader, who, quite possibly, has never seen anything of the sort? I was passing a pretty little villa, which stood rather back from the road, in its own grounds, with bright flower-beds in front---creepers wandering over the walls and hanging in festoons about the bow-windows--an easy-chair forgotten on the lawn, with a newspaper lying near it--a small pug-dog “couchant” before it, resolved to guard the treasure even at the sacrifice of life--and a front-door standing invitingly half-open. “Here is my chance,” I thought, “for testing the reverse action of the Magic Watch!” I pressed the 'reversal-peg' and walked in. In another house, the entrance of a stranger might cause surprise--perhaps anger, even going so far as to expel the said stranger with violence: but here, I knew, nothing of the sort could happen. The ordinary course of events first, to think nothing about me; then, hearing my footsteps to look up and see me; and then to wonder what business I had there--would be reversed by the action of my Watch. They would first wonder who I was, then see me, then look down, and think no more about me. And as to being expelled with violence, that event would necessarily come first in this case. “So, if I can once get in,” I said to myself, “all risk of expulsion will be over!” {Image...'The pug-dog sat up'} The pug-dog sat up, as a precautionary measure, as I passed; but, as I took no notice of the treasure he was guarding, he let me go by without even one remonstrant bark. “He that takes my life,” he seemed to be saying, wheezily, to himself, “takes trash: But he that takes the Daily Telegraph--!” But this awful contingency I did not face. The party in the drawing-room--I had walked straight in, you understand, without ringing the bell, or giving any notice of my approach--consisted of four laughing rosy children, of ages from about fourteen down to ten, who were, apparently, all coming towards the door (I found they were really walking backwards), while their mother, seated by the fire with some needlework on her lap, was saying, just as I entered the room, “Now, girls, you may get your things on for a walk.” To my utter astonishment--for I was not yet accustomed to the action of the Watch “all smiles ceased,” (as Browning says) on the four pretty faces, and they all got out pieces of needle-work, and sat down. No one noticed me in the least, as I quietly took a chair and sat down to watch them.