it owes its name were not to be approached with casual grasps.

'Oh Monsieur, I wish you were a Beau,' sighed Nuttie. 'Why, are you
too stupid to go and get it?'

'It is a proof of his superior intelligence,' said Mr. Dutton.

'But really it is too ridiculous--too provoking--to have come all
this way and not get it,' cried the tantalised Nuttie. 'Oh, Gerard,
are you taking off your boots and stockings? You duck!'

'Just what I wish I was,' said the youth, rolling up his trousers.

But even the paddling in did not answer. Mr. Dutton called out
anxiously, 'Take care, Gerard, the bottom may be soft,' and came down
to the very verge just in time to hold out his hand, and prevent an
utterly disastrous fall, for Gerard, in spite of his bare feet, sank
at once into mud, and on the first attempt to take a step forward,
found his foot slipping away from under him, and would in another
instant have tumbled backwards into the slush and weeds. He
scrambled back, his hat falling off into the reeds, and splashing Mr.
Dutton all over, while Monsieur began to bark 'with astonishment at
seeing his master in such a plight,' declared the ladies, who stood
convulsed with cruel laughter.

'Isn't it dreadful?' exclaimed Ursula.

'Well! It might have been worse,' gravely said Mr. Dutton, wiping
off the more obnoxious of his splashes with his pocket handkerchief.