arrived; the excited neighing of five hundred horses was music to his
ears. His brother subalterns hailed his return with loud and exuberant
noises, made disparaging remarks about the smartness of his clothes,
sat on him all over the floor and rumpled him. On sighting the Babe,
The O'Murphy went mad and careered round the table wriggling like
an Oriental dancer, uttering shrill yelps of delight; presently he
bounced out of the window, to enter some minutes later by the same
route, and lay the offering of a freshly slain rat at his best
beloved's feet.

At this moment the skipper came in plastered thick with the mud of the
line, nodded cheerfully to his junior sub and instantaneously fell
upon the buttered toast.

"Have a good time, Son?" he mumbled. "How's merrie England?"

"Oh, England's all right, Sir," said the Babe, tickling The O'Murphy's
upturned tummy--"quite all right; but it's jolly to be home again
among one's ain folk."

PATLANDER.

* * * * *

[Illustration: OUT OF REACH.

"Just ask Dr. Jones to run round to my place right away. Our cook's
fallen downstairs, broke her leg; the housemaid's got chicken-pox; and
my two boys have been knocked down by a taxi."