The question was addressed to Margaret; but she hesitated, tightened her lips, and looked down. “Oh, it is one of our neighbor's,” the General skilfully interjected, as he leaned forward and tried ineffectually to give his guest a warning glance. “Wynn is a great hand at amusing the little ones. He thought this child needed more exercise and fresh air, and he asked his mother to let it play here.” Galt was now watching the boy, and so intently that he only half heard what the General said and quite failed to notice that his question had embarrassed his hostess. “Catch it! Run round the other way, little man!” he cried out, leaning forward with his cup in his hand. “There! there it goes!” The child paused just an instant, and raised his appealing, long-lashed eyes to the speaker; as he did so the kitten bounded like a rabbit across the grass and up a tree a few yards away. “Now, see what _you_ did!” Lionel cried, disappointedly, as he stood panting, his silken tresses tossed about his face. “You let him get away. I'd have had him if you hadn't spoken. But I don't care, I can get him!” And he was off like the wind toward the tree, on a lower bough of which the kitten was perched, blandly eying his pursuer. “You are as fond of children as ever,” the General remarked, “and it proves that your heart is in the right spot. Show me a man who has no use for little tots, and I'll show you a man who will cheat you in a transaction.” “It certainly is a good quality,” Margaret said, as she proffered sugar for his tea. “We naturally expect it of women, but it always seems exceptional in men, especially men who have their time fully occupied.” Sylvester laughed reminiscently. “I've seen Kenneth stop on the street to chat with a dirty-faced newsboy when the general superintendent of his road was waving an important telegram at him; and I've seen the boy walk off with a quarter for a penny paper, too.” “I seem to be getting my share of compliments, at any rate,” Galt laughed. “I'd call it flattery if I could accuse your hospitality of anything not wholly genuine.” “Uncle Tom certainly means what he says,” Margaret affirmed. Her glance drifted in the direction the sporting child had taken, and she uttered a sharp, startled scream. “Oh, he'll fall!” she cried. Following her eyes, the others saw that Lionel, still chasing the kitten, had climbed the tree to its lower boughs ten or twelve feet from the ground, and, with the prize still above him, sat in a decidedly perilous position on a bending branch so intent on reaching the animal that he was oblivious of his danger. “Don't be frightened, I'll get him down,” Galt assured her, with an easy laugh, and he sprang up and ran across the grass, saying, under his breath: “Plucky little scamp! He'll break his neck!”