"You don't happen to have any bullets about you?" said he. "No," George said, truthfully. "I had five of father's revolver cartridges, but they were taken away the day Nurse turned out my pockets to see if I had taken the knob of the bathroom door by mistake." "Quite so," said the sportsman, "these accidents will occur. You don't carry firearms, then, I presume?" "I haven't any fire_arms_," said George, "but I have a fire_work_. It's only a squib one of the boys gave me, if that's any good." And he began to feel among the string and peppermints, and buttons and tops and nibs and chalk and foreign postage stamps in his knickerbocker pockets. "One could but try," the sportsman replied, and he held out his hand. But Jane pulled at her brother's jacket-tail and whispered, "Ask him what he wants it for." So then the sportsman had to confess that he wanted the firework to kill the white grouse with; and, when they came to look, there was the white grouse himself, sitting in the snow, looking quite pale and careworn, and waiting anxiously for the matter to be decided one way or the other. George put all the things back in his pockets, and said, "No, I shan't. The reason for shooting him stopped yesterday--I heard Father say so--so it wouldn't be fair, anyhow. I'm very sorry; but I can't--so there!" The sportsman said nothing, only he shook his fist at Jane, and then he got on the slide and tried to go toward the Crystal Palace--which was not easy, because that way is uphill. So they left him trying, and went on. Before they started, the white grouse thanked them in a few pleasant, well-chosen words, and then they took a sideways slanting run and started off again on the great slide, and so away toward the North Pole and the twinkling, beautiful lights. The great slide went on and on, and the lights did not seem to come much nearer, and the white silence wrapped around them as they slid along the wide, icy path. Then once again the silence was broken to bits by someone calling: "Hey! You there! Stop!" "Tumble for your life!" cried George, and tumbled as before, stopping in the only possible way, and Jane stopped on top of him, and they crawled to the edge and came suddenly on a butterfly collector, who was looking for specimens with a pair of blue glasses and a blue net and a blue book with colored plates. "Excuse me," said the collector, "but have you such a thing as a needle about you--a very long needle?" "I have a needle _book_," replied Jane, politely, "but there aren't any needles in it now. George took them all to do the things with pieces of cork--in the 'Boy's Own Scientific Experimenter' and 'The Young Mechanic.' He did not do the things, but he did for the needles." "Curiously enough," said the collector, "I too wish to use the needle in connection with cork." "I have a hatpin in my hood," said Jane. "I fastened the fur with it when it caught in the nail on the greenhouse door. It is very long and sharp--would that do?"