But he was back in a few moments, having discarded his broom and provided himself, from some mysterious source, with an exquisite bouquet of flowers. “Buy a posy, buy a posy! Only a ‘ap’ny!” he chanted, with the melancholy drawl of a professional beggar. “_Don’t_ buy it!” was Her Majesty’s edict, as she looked down, with a lofty scorn that seemed curiously mixed with tender interest, on the ragged creature at her feet. But this time I turned rebel, and ignored the royal commands. Such lovely flowers, and of forms so entirely new to me, were not to be abandoned at the bidding of any little maid, however imperious. I bought the bouquet: and the little boy, after popping the halfpenny into his mouth, turned head-over-heels, as if to ascertain whether the human mouth is really adapted to serve as a money-box. With wonder, that increased every moment, I turned over the flowers, and examined them one by one: there was not a single one among them that I could remember having ever seen before. At last I turned to the nursemaid. “Do these flowers grow wild about here? I never saw——” but the speech died away on my lips. The nursemaid had vanished! “You can put me down, _now_, if you like,” Sylvie quietly remarked. I obeyed in silence, and could only ask myself “Is this a _dream_?”, on finding Sylvie and Bruno walking one on either side of me, and clinging to my hands with the ready confidence of childhood. “You’re larger than when I saw you last!” I began. “Really I think we ought to be introduced again! There’s so much of you that I never met before, you know.” “Very well!” Sylvie merrily replied. “This is _Bruno_. It doesn’t take long. He’s only got one name!” “There’s _another_ name to me!” Bruno protested, with a reproachful look at the Mistress of the Ceremonies. “And it’s—‘_Esquire_’!” “Oh, of course. I forgot,” said Sylvie. “Bruno—_Esquire_!” “And did you come here to meet _me_, my children?” I enquired. “You know I _said_ we’d come on Tuesday,” Sylvie explained. “Are we the proper size for common children?” “Quite the right size for _children_,” I replied, (adding mentally “though not _common_ children, by any means!”) “But what became of the nursemaid?” “It are _gone_!” Bruno solemnly replied. “Then it wasn’t solid, like Sylvie and you?” “No. Oo couldn’t _touch_ it, oo know. If oo walked _at_ it, oo’d go right froo!” “I quite expected you’d find it out, once,” said Sylvie. “Bruno ran it against a telegraph post, by accident. And it went in two halves. But you were looking the other way.” I felt that I had indeed missed an opportunity: to witness such an event as a nursemaid going ‘in two halves’ does not occur twice in a life-time! “When did oo guess it were Sylvie?” Bruno enquired. [Illustration: ‘IT WENT IN TWO HALVES’] “I didn’t guess it, till it _was_ Sylvie,” I said. “But how did you manage the nursemaid?” “_Bruno_ managed it,” said Sylvie. “It’s called a Phlizz.” “And how do you make a Phlizz, Bruno?”