On stepping into a small vestibule, paved with black and white lozenges, and fitted up with an iron umbrella stand, a Moorish lamp and a large yellow china pug dog, the Prophet found himself at once faced by Mr. Sagittarius, whose pallid countenance, nervous eye and suspicious demeanour plainly proclaimed him to be, as he had stated, very rightly and properly going about in fear of his life. “Go to the schoolroom, my darlings,” he whispered to his children. “Why, what have you there?” “Choclets,” said Capricornus. “From the pretty lady, mulius pulchrum,” added the little Corona. “Who is a mulibus pulchrum, my love?” asked Mr. Sagittarius, before Capricornus had time to correct his sister’s Latin. “It was Miss Minerva,” said the Prophet. “We happened to meet her.” “Indeed, sir. Run away, my pretties, and don’t eat more than one each, or mater familias will not approve.” Then, as the little ones disappeared into the shadows of the region above, he added to the Prophet,-- “You’ve nearly been the death of Madame, sir.” “I’m sure I’m very sorry,” said the Prophet. “Sorrow is no salve, sir, no salve at all. Were it not for her books I fear we might have lost her.” “Good gracious!” “Mercifully her books have comforted her. She is resting among them now. Madame is possessed of a magnificent library, sir, encyclopaedic in its scope and cosmopolitan in its point of view. In it are represented every age and every race since the dawn of letters; thousands upon thousands of authors, sir, Rabelais and Dean Farrar, Lamb and the Hindoos, Mettlelink and the pith of the great philosophers such as John Oliver Hobbes, Locke, Hume and Earl Spencer; the biting sarcasm of Hiny, the pathos of Peps, the oratorical master-strokes of such men as Gladstone, Demosthenes and Keir Hardie; the romance of Kipling, sir, of Bret Harte and Danty Rossini; the poetry of Kempis a Browning and of Elizabeth Thomas Barrett--all, all are there bound in Persian calf. Among these she seeks for solace. To these she flies in hours of anguish.” “Does she indeed?” said the Prophet, feeling thoroughly overwhelmed. “She desires me to take you to her at once, sir, there to confer and”--he lowered his voice and trembled visibly--“to arrange measures for the protection of my life.” The Prophet found himself wishing that he had been less precipitate in covertly alluding to Sir Tiglath’s long desire of assault and battery, but before he had time to wish anything for more than half a minute, Mr. Sagittarius had guided him ceremoniously across the hall and was turning the handle of a door that was decorated with black and scarlet paint. “Here, sir,” he whispered, “you will find Madame surrounded by the authors whom she loves, by their portraits, their biographies and their writings. Here she communes with the great philosophers, sir, the poets, the historians and the humourists of the entire world, from the earliest days down to this very moment--in Persian calf, sir.”