the Severn Father, or praised her but for her grace; for she is like the body and soul of a princess straight from a western fairyland--so wild and pliant, so full of laughter and of mystery, so uncertain in her gay and sorrowing moods. On my word, though the science of education must be a very splendid thing, untaught, untrained, uninstructed as we Shrewsbury boys would now be considered, I would not change places with the most scientifically educated man in England, who had never known a river such as that. From _Changes and Chances_ by Henry W. Nevinson. Copyright by Harcourt, Brace and Company, Inc. THE BURGLARS KENNETH GRAHAME It was much too fine a night to think of going to bed at once, and so, although the witching hour of nine P. M. had struck, Edward and I were still leaning out of the open window in our nightshirts, watching the play of the cedar-branch shadows on the moonlit lawn, and planning schemes of fresh deviltry for the sunshiny morrow. From below, strains of the jocund piano declared that the Olympians were enjoying themselves in their listless impotent way; for the new curate had been bidden to dinner that night, and was at the moment unclerically proclaiming to all the world that he feared no foe. His discordant vociferations doubtless started a train of thought in Edward’s mind, for he presently remarked, _à propos_ of nothing whatever that had been said before, “I believe the new curate’s rather gone on Aunt Maria.” I scouted the notion; “Why, she’s quite old,” I said. (She must have seen some five-and-twenty summers.) “Of course she is,” replied Edward scornfully. “It’s not her, it’s her money he’s after, you bet!” “Didn’t know she had any money,” I observed timidly. “Sure to have,” said my brother with confidence. “Heaps and heaps.” Silence ensued, both our minds being busy with the new situation thus presented: mine, in wonderment at this flaw that so often declared itself in enviable natures of fullest endowment,--in a grown-up man and a good cricketer, for instance, even as this curate; Edward’s (apparently) in the consideration of how such a state of things, supposing it existed, could be best turned to his own advantage. “Bobby Ferris told me,” began Edward in due course, “that there was a fellow spooning his sister once----” “What’s spooning?” I asked meekly. “O I dunno,” said Edward indifferently. “It’s--it’s--it’s just a thing they do, you know. And he used to carry notes and messages and things between ’em, and he got a shilling almost every time.” “What, from each of ’em?” I innocently inquired.