So she told him the story, in the middle of which the wheelbarrow upset, because Maurice laughed. So he sat on a log of wood, and Bryda picked up the wheelbarrow, got into it, and began in the words of one of her lesson-books, with a little alteration to suit the occasion. "Friend! Roman! Countryman! lend me your ears! I am Charon--" "What?" asked Maurice. "Don't spoil my speech! You may only say 'Hear, hear!' as they do in Parliament." "But suppose I don't want to hear?" Bryda had no notion of what they would do under such unlikely circumstances; so, after thinking a little, she merely said, "Don't be silly, Maurice!" And that sort of answer puts an end to any argument quite easily. "This is my dog Cerberus, with three heads," went on Bryda, pointing to Toby. "My! what a lot of bones he would eat!" said his master. Bryda suddenly jumped down from her rather unsteady pulpit. "Oh, we _will_ have fun! Here, Maurice, put on my white pinafore. You shall be a ghost, and I will get into the tub with my dog Cerberus, and ferry you over the river," she said. "It won't hold two," said Maurice, looking rather doubtfully at the rotten tub which Bryda pushed into the filthy waters, making a splash and a most horrible smell as it went in. "Oh, ghosts don't want much room! Now, Cerberus, in you go!" and in the poor dog went, hastily and ungracefully; being, in fact, thrown in head foremost. After one howl he resigned himself, and lay down at the bottom of the tub, into which unsteady boat Bryda, armed with her own small spade, followed with Maurice's help. Having balanced herself by crouching down, so as to bring the center of gravity to the right place, she proceeded to paddle, or, as she called it, to row with the little wooden spade, splashing a good deal, and, of course, making the tub turn round and round, and wriggle very uncomfortably in the pool. "Well, it doesn't matter," said Charon, giving up in despair, and looking very red in the face. "We can pretend I crossed the Styx to fetch you. Now I must speak to the soul in Latin, because, of course, Charon and Cerberus talked Latin always." "I suppose Cerberus barked in Latin--all three mouths at once," said Maurice; "what a horrid row it must have been!" "Now talk away," said Bryda. "But we don't know Latin; I've only just begun at _hic, haec, hoc_." "_That_ doesn't matter; we must make it up, of course. If we put 'us' or 'o' at the end of every word it will sound exactly like the stuff Cousin Ronald learns. Now: Poor-us soul-us, do-us you-us want-o to cross over-o?" "Yes-o," replied Maurice promptly. "Then-us come-o--oh! oh!" screamed Bryda, making the last word very long indeed; for she trod on the _one_ tail of the dog Cerberus, causing that remarkable animal to jump up howling. Charon's ferryboat was not built to allow of athletic sports on board, so it went over, and Bryda went in.