"Well, it does rather," Mark had replied, and then to his great delight
she took a pen and wrote that James Lidderdale had married Grace Alethea
Trehawke on June 28th, 1880, at St. Tugdual's Church, Nancepean,
Cornwall, and to his even greater delight that on April 25th, 1881, Mark
Lidderdale had been born at 142 Lima Street, Notting Dale, London, W.,
and baptized on May 21st, 1881, at St. Wilfred's Mission Church, Lima
Street.

"Happy now?" she had asked.

Mark had nodded, and from that moment, if he went into his father's
study, he always opened the Family Bible and examined solemnly his own
short history wreathed in forget-me-nots and lilies of the valley.

This afternoon, after looking as usual at the entry of his birth and
baptism written in his mother's pretty pointed handwriting, he searched
for Dante's _Inferno_ illustrated by Gustave Doré, a large copy of which
had recently been presented to his father by the Servers and Choir of
St. Wilfred's. The last time he had been looking at this volume he had
caught a glimpse of a lot of people buried in the ground with only their
heads sticking out, a most attractive picture which he had only just
discovered when he had heard his father's footsteps and had closed the
book in a hurry.

Mark tried to find this picture, but the volume was large and the
pictures on the way of such fascination that it was long before he found
it. When he did, he thought it even more satisfying at a second glance,
although he wished he knew what they were all doing buried in the ground
like that. Mark was not satisfied with horrors even after he had gone
right through the Dante; in fact, his appetite was only whetted, and he