get over them all by hook, which she explains as being the proper
development of her muscles and physique generally, and by crook, which she
defines as circumventing the slave drivers of her sex, a task which she
seems to think can easily be accomplished by finessing."

"And what was the last thing?" Mrs. Orton Beg inquired, smiling
indulgently.

"Oh, that was very simple," Lord Dawne rejoined. "Diavolo, dressed in
velvet, was caught and taken up by a policeman for recklessly driving a
hansom in Oxford Street, Angelica being inside the same disguised in
something of her mother's."

"I wonder it was Angelica who went inside!" Mrs. Orton Beg exclaimed.

"Well, that was what her mother said," Lord Dawne replied; "and both her
parents seem to think the matter was not nearly so bad as it might have
been in consequence. Mr. Hamilton-Wells had to pay a fine for the furious
driving, and use all his influence with the Press to keep the thing out of
the papers."

"But where did the children get the hansom?" Mrs. Beale begged to be
informed.

"I regret to say that they hailed it through the dining room window, and
plied the driver with raw brandy until his venal nature gave in to their
earnestly persuasive eloquence and the contents of their purses, and he
consented to let Diavolo 'just try what it was like to sit up on that high
box,' Angelica having previously got inside, and, of course, the moment
the young scamp had the reins in his hands he drove off full tilt."