Trying To Change A Sovereign.

their hands , threw themselves into each other ' s arms , and in the triple embrace convulsively Avept and sobbed ivith much emotion . " Take this , " in broken accents murmured the utterer of the ivord " Bryant , " as he lifted the lanthorn and placed it in tbe bands of Johnson . " Take this , and DO TOUR DUTT ! " Then , opening the front of the machine , lie solemnly blew out the flame burning within .

The group were at once plunged in total gloom . A darkness that could be felt . The silence—the solemn silence—Avas only slightly broken b y the voice that had . before been heard . This time the Avords Avere uttered in the loAvest of whispers . The sentence uttered conveyed an aivfnl injunction —• " Keep it dark ! "

CHAPTER IV . UJ'DEE THE CLOCK . I HAVE been given to understand that those distinguished State prisoners who involuntarily accept the hospitality of Mr . Speaker not unfrequentlfind their

y rest disturbed by the booming of Big Ben immediately over their heads , or the constant ivhizzing ancl ivhirring ancl other indefinable noises and vibrations incidental to the campanological arrangements of the mighty horologe of which the great bell is an accessory . To digress for one moment , I would point out that this apparently trivial subject has found a limner in the artist who has adorned ivith his able pencil one of the panels in the Peers' avenue .

Ton will remember Lord Macaulay ' s touching descri ption of the last sleep of Argyll . His Tory persecutor , with anguish distorting his features , gazes upon the peaceful countenance of the sleeping patriot so soon to slumber in that repose which only knows one waking . * " And he can sleep tranquilly like this , who in an hour will be a corpse , ivhile I- —alas ! I—shall never know refreshing slumber again ! " be apostrophises . I have a shrewd idea why the MacCallum Mohr so thoroughly enjoyed his "forty . " Depend upon it he

had only shortly before been removed from the guardianship of the Right Honourable Mr . Brand , and from beneath the never-ceasing tick tick ; tick tick ; whiz , whorrle ancl whin- ; bing , bom , boom , of the lunacy-engendering clock- tower . The firm of Catesbj- ancl Company ( Limited ) carried on business on the premises of one of the members of that commercial establishment , Mr . Thomas Percywhoas a gentleman pensionerhad an official resi dence adjoining the Houses

, , , of Parliament . So far from being anxious to announce " rTo connection with the business next door , " these enterprising partners sought to be enabled to resort to the untradesmanlike device of asserting " It ' s all the same concern , " and ivith this end in view they busil y engaged themselves in tunnelling throuo-h the wall that divided the tenements at the basement . They worked chiefl y at nihtsubsisting on cold viands brought secretlinto their cellar .

g , y Indeed , every day was " cold mutton " clay with them , and , from the character of their diet ancl the nature of their operations , consisting , as they chiefly did , in the active use of the pick , their occupation might be said to constitute a perpetual pic-nic . They were , one midnight , hacking away at the brickwork as usual , but