ing heart. Later John and I met in a corner and decided to declare the town a vicious place and most filthy.

"Better take a little rest," said John to him kindly, "while I get the car ready." But not that artistic grasshopper.

"No rest like congenial work, Ward," he exclaimed, picking up his kit. "There is a fine fortress here, built by Alexander VI., a most immoral Pope, but with excellent ideas on architecture. Must be some good in a man who leaves these monuments behind."

"Well, only one way to settle it," said our smiling guest. "Coming too, Mrs. Ward?" And I did, and kept off the children, that he might work in peace. Wonderful drawing power, these artists!

"Possibly Lucretia Borgia herself has stopped in this old fortress," he imparted, after we had seated ourselves on the northern rampart. "Her father, the Pope, married her to Giovanni Sforza of Pesaro, and she must have passed over this road many times in going to Rome. Then, later, she followed the Via Flaminia to Ferrara escorted by a splendid cavalcade to meet her third husband, one of the Este family."

I was a little shocked, because even the Minerva Club, with its broad policy, never alludes to Alexander VI. and his daughter. I intimated as much, delicately, of course.

"There never has been any proof that Lucretia was a monster," retorted the Douglas Warwick quite warmly, as though he knew the lady and had taken tea with her. "From all I can learn, she was simply a weak, passive woman. Her brother, Cæsar Borgia, was a horrible fiend. Aided by his father, he deposed all the petty rulers of the Umbrian cities, through which you will pass, and reigned fiercely in their places. The old Pope was a beast with but two traits worthy of a human creature. He was gentleness itself with his children and, crowning virtue, he built fine strongholds."

"Oh, well," I replied stiffly, "if you

judge a man's moral worth by his architectural ability-No," I added hastily, as he was about to interrupt, "the Borgia are not a family I think it proper to discuss."

He quite snorted with anger, but I felt it was time to stop him. One can never tell what an artist is going to say, painting from the nude so much. Besides, he was extremely well posted, and, on the whole, I preferred him in the motor car, ignorantly asking me about carbureters.

There were hills from that time onthe foothills of the Apennines-and there was a beautiful landscape of well-farmed valleys and dark-scarred rock showing many traces of Etrurian tombs, bits of Roman ruins and frequent columns bearing the crossed keys and mitre of past Popes. The artist said it was a mute story of the Invaders-rude heathen, great warriors, and Holy Church; but it was the crossed keys and papal mitre that turned me cold.

By the time we had reached Ortricoli the sky was clouded, which for lack of shadow rescued us from any attempt to have it immortalised on paper, but gave our companion an opportunity of arranging his cap for rain, although John assured him that, lacking a canopy, such a thing was impossible.

"Still, if you had a canopy and it did rain you would use it, wouldn't you?" persisted Douglas Warwick.

John begrudgingly admitted the possibility.

"Well, that's the way I feel about the cap. I paid extra for this waterproof attachment, and I ought to use it."

John kicked his beloved machine in the front hub and we went at the cap. The directions said "with a few deft twists" the inside of the headgear, which was lined with rubber, could be transposed into a most satisfactory protection for the heaviest storms, but the very suggestion that we must work deftly seemed to turn our fingers into thumbs, and the results were various. It seemed to please the artist, who likened it to modelling in clay, and was most enthusiastic over the prairie dog I evolved. John suggested that we leave it as a prairie dog, since it was certainly at its best in that form, but our guest stuck to his task, and finally got

away, wearing a sort of vacuum cap, used generally for the propagation of hair. The sun came out immediately, although there had been rain on the road we were travelling, making the hills dangerously slippery, and here is told of the Dropping of the Sprag.

The sprag had been an afterthought, and had been sent on from the factory at John's request in case we should find ourselves obliged to change from the high to the low speed on some steep hill, and in that second of transmission give the car a chance of slipping back. There was a brake, of course, but even I could see that it is a stupid thing to stop a car and try to send it forward, too, so the sprag was ordered, and occasioned a good deal of levity in autoing circles. It was heavy and forked, and it had caused us trouble at first by getting caught in the apron. From Formia to Rome we had carried it at our feet on the floor of the car, and there it lay quite contented, but when we left Rome it had been very sternly put in place, and being less afraid of motor cars, it sat tight on its stout wire pulley until the hill was reached.

I say the hill, for while we may pass over-indeed, skip over-many higher ones, surely we will never find one that will so suddenly slap us in the face. John Bunyan's Christian, had he been autoing along the stony way, would have called it "The Stumbling Hill for Proud Motors." It slyly lay in wait for us around the corner of another hill more mild which we had been rolling up on the high speed. It was slimy with wet clay, its precipitous sides were woefully unguarded by walls, and it was a grade of twenty per cent. Before John had a chance to change into the low speed we were half way up the hill. Then the engine laboured, and as John turned the lever into the neutral the rear wheel slipped in the mud, skidded towards the exposed cliff and the car started backwards. The brake was as the hand of a little child.

"Drop the sprag," said John, and though it was new to me, I slipped the ring to which the wire was attached from off the hook. There was a clank, there was a scraping sound in the gravel, a bump, a slight lifting up of the car, and

we were still. Then with snorting engine we climbed the hill again.

"I think," said Douglas Warwick, when we had reached the top, "that something hit your Girlie." But John and I only smiled, and both had cognac when we reached the Hotel of The Angel.

I don't know which angel has been so honoured, but we were very near all of them in our perch at Narni, and our windows gave upon the depths to which an angel or a human might fall if either leaned over too far. The town itself was a delightful one of crooked streets, with an ugly old castle way up aloft, which, like the fortress of Alexander, is used as a prison. What would they do in Italy for prisons and barracks if it wasn't for old castles? I don't object to these uses particularly, but when they turn a stronghold with a lovely moat around it. into a post-office, I am aggravated to the point of never buying a stamp.

John was very happy in Narni. His sprag and his engine had worked beautifully, and the owner of the stable, the rimessa, as it is called here, where The Means was kept, had locked the door and presented him with the key. It was as big as the key of the Bastile, and quite as old. There was no place for it except to be carried in the hand. As a result it was a dozen times left at the caffé and in the little shops, and some one would come running to the hotel with it. If I lost track of John for an instant the villagers would ask if the signora was looking for the signor of the key, and if he was not in any of the dark ways he would surely be found in the stable or locking or unlocking the door with the air of a landed proprietor.

This absorption led us into a difficulty before the night was over-or was it the fault of the artist? He had accompanied us in a random fashion on our walks, breaking away suddenly every now and then to squint at a building, an act which terrorised the children, who made horns with their fingers to keep off his evil eye, so it was not surprising when bedtime came to find him missing; but John, in fear that he had wandered over the cliff, started on what he called a still hunt. It developed into a hunt that was about as quiet as that old play of The Still Alarm,

in which everybody just "hallers" all the time.

It was John falling up and down the staircase streets coupled with the awful things he said that broke the silences at the beginning of the hunt. The few lights had been extinguished, and I never knew a moon to shine so "fitfully" before. It would lure us into a corner that seemed quite bright, and then, suddenly "fitting," leave us there to find our way out. Twice I bumped into John and screamed "Burglar! Burglar!" as one naturally does in such an instance, before he could stop me, and it irritated him. He said no one would know what I meant if I cried "Burglar" anyway, and pondering over that in the dark, the thought became dreadful. We might be murdered in any one of the corners, and not a soul would come to our call for help, although John with his dying breath would probably Italianise his speech and faintly ask for "helperia."

In consequence I refused to go into any more dark ways, not that I place any value on my life, but the cutthroats would probably take my rings also, and I am perfectly devoted to my ruby. Indeed, I was so fearful, as we felt our way back to the piazza, that I took it off for safekeeping. Then John jolted me again, and of course I dropped it. Carrying the ring doubled up in my hand seemed an excellent safeguard until it fell, and then I knew by my great reluctance to tell John about it that I had been doing a foolish thing. I had some thought of marking the spot by dropping my handkerchief and sending one of the hotel servants with a lantern to hunt for them both. The "I Shot an Arrow" song suggested it, but John heard the tinkle, and stopping, asked me if I could have lost anything.

"Could I?" I repeated cautiously. "I suppose I could. I lost three side combs last week, and my Aunt Jane is always losing things."

"Suppose you take an inventory," suggested John.

"Wouldn't that be a waste of time?" I replied. "I've a good many things on, but only one thing is dropped. Let us strike matches and look, first for what is lost and afterwards at what is left."

You see I wasn't going to confess unless I had to.

John said it made him uncomfortable to be so in the dark, and I urged the matches again, whereat he grumbled out something about "not meaning that, but what's the use. There's no good explaining to a woman," which I overlooked, being large spirited by nature, and began examining the cobbles. In an incredibly short time, as is always the case when a man strikes a match and holds it to the ground, the street swarmed with people. I don't know where they came from. They were not around when we needed them, and they all began hunting with us in a vague way, quite ready to accept whatever the search yielded. One man, however, was braver, and asked John for what he was seeking. I had feared this, yet dumbly hoped for it, mindful of the recent slur upon my sex, for it embarrassed John, not knowing himself what he was seeking, and he stammered and simpered, and jerked out something airily about "just looking for a friend."

This statement created a great deal of ill-concealed merriment, and when I found the ring he started to prove to that "aggregation of Allobrogi" that he had a friend and a lost friend, and if he couldn't find him by striking matches, he would see what the power of the human voice could do. Then began his walking through the wide street of the Priory, making horrible the quiet of the night by loud halloas and cries of "Douglas Warwick," and sometimes other expressions not dignified, but quite as impressive to the inhabitants of Narni, who, following in our wake, little wotted the import of his words.

"Come out, you shine!" bellowed John as he reached the piazza. "Answer, doggone you!" "I suppose you think you're cute!" he launched successively, and lashed himself into further vituperation.

I aided a little. "Mr. Warwick, are you killed?" I called three times distinctly, and the third time I was quite sure I had a reply. It was way off, but as I told John, it was more than he had received with all of his abuse.

"That's the only way to get at him," he answered wildly. "If I'll insult him, he'll have to come out to fight me. He's

away, wearing a sort of vacuum cap, used generally for the propagation of hair. The sun came out immediately, although there had been rain on the road we were travelling, making the hills dangerously slippery, and here is told of the Dropping of the Sprag.

The sprag had been an afterthought, and had been sent on from the factory at John's request in case we should find ourselves obliged to change from the high to the low speed on some steep hill, and in that second of transmission give the car a chance of slipping back. There was a brake, of course, but even I could see that it is a stupid thing to stop a car and try to send it forward, too, so the sprag was ordered, and occasioned a good deal of levity in autoing circles. It was heavy and forked, and it had caused us trouble at first by getting caught in the apron. From Formia to Rome we had carried it at our feet on the floor of the car, and there it lay quite contented, but when we left Rome it had been very sternly put in place, and being less afraid of motor cars, it sat tight on its stout wire pulley until the hill was reached.

I say the hill, for while we may pass over-indeed, skip over-many higher ones, surely we will never find one that will so suddenly slap us in the face. John Bunyan's Christian, had he been. autoing along the stony way, would have called it "The Stumbling Hill for Proud Motors." It slyly lay in wait for us around the corner of another hill more mild which we had been rolling up on the high speed. It was slimy with wet clay, its precipitous sides were woefully. unguarded by walls, and it was a grade of twenty per cent. Before John had a chance to change into the low speed we were half way up the hill. Then the engine laboured, and as John turned the lever into the neutral the rear wheel slipped in the mud, skidded towards the exposed cliff and the car started backwards. The brake was as the hand of a little child.

"Drop the sprag," said John, and though it was new to me, I slipped the ring to which the wire was attached from off the hook. There was a clank, there was a scraping sound in the gravel, a bump, a slight lifting up of the car, and

we were still. Then with snorting engine we climbed the hill again.

"I think," said Douglas Warwick, when we had reached the top, "that something hit your Girlie." But John and I only smiled, and both had cognac when we reached the Hotel of The Angel.

I don't know which angel has been so honoured, but we were very near all of them in our perch at Narni, and our windows gave upon the depths to which an angel or a human might fall if either leaned over too far. The town itself was a delightful one of crooked streets, with an ugly old castle way up aloft, which, like the fortress of Alexander, is used as a prison. What would they do in Italy for prisons and barracks if it wasn't for old castles? I don't object to these uses particularly, but when they turn a stronghold with a lovely moat around it into a post-office, I am aggravated to the point of never buying a stamp.

John was very happy in Narni. His sprag and his engine had worked beautifully, and the owner of the stable, the rimessa, as it is called here, where The Means was kept, had locked the door and presented him with the key. It was as big as the key of the Bastile, and quite as old. There was no place for it except to be carried in the hand. As a result it was a dozen times left at the caffé and in the little shops, and some one would come running to the hotel with it. If I lost track of John for an instant the villagers would ask if the signora was looking for the signor of the key, and if he was not in any of the dark ways he would surely. be found in the stable or locking or unlocking the door with the air of a landed proprietor.

This absorption led us into a difficulty before the night was over-or was it the fault of the artist? He had accompanied us in a random fashion on our walks, breaking away suddenly every now and then to squint at a building, an act which terrorised the children, who made horns with their fingers to keep off his evil eye, so it was not surprising when bedtime came to find him missing; but John, in fear that he had wandered over the cliff, started on what he called a still hunt. It developed into a hunt that was about as quiet as that old play of The Still Alarm,

in which everybody just “hallers” all the time.

It was John falling up and down the staircase streets coupled with the awful things he said that broke the silences at the beginning of the hunt. The few lights had been extinguished, and I never knew a moon to shine so "fitfully" before. It would lure us into a corner that seemed quite bright, and then, suddenly "fitting," leave us there to find our way out. Twice I bumped into John and screamed "Burglar! Burglar!" as one naturally does in such an instance, before he could stop me, and it irritated him. He said no one would know what I meant if I cried "Burglar" anyway, and pondering over that in the dark, the thought became dreadful. We might be murdered in any one of the corners, and not a soul would come to our call for help, although John with his dying breath would probably Italianise his speech and faintly ask for "helperia."

In consequence I refused to go into any more dark ways, not that I place any value on my life, but the cutthroats would probably take my rings also, and I am perfectly devoted to my ruby. Indeed, I was so fearful, as we felt our way back to the piazza, that I took it off for safekeeping. Then John jolted me again, and of course I dropped it. Carrying the ring doubled up in my hand seemed an excellent safeguard until it fell, and then I knew by my great reluctance to tell John about it that I had been doing a foolish thing. I had some thought of marking the spot by dropping my handkerchief and sending one of the hotel servants with a lantern to hunt for them both. The "I Shot an Arrow" song suggested it, but John heard the tinkle, and stopping, asked me if I could have lost anything.

"Could I?" I repeated cautiously. "I suppose I could. I lost three side combs last week, and my Aunt Jane is always losing things."

"Suppose you take an inventory," suggested John.

“Wouldn't that be a waste of time?" I replied. “I've a good many things on, but only one thing is dropped. Let us strike matches and look, first for what is lost and afterwards at what is left."

You see I wasn't going to confess unless I had to.

John said it made him uncomfortable to be so in the dark, and I urged the matches again, whereat he grumbled out something about “not meaning that, but what's the use. There's no good explaining to a woman," which I overlooked, being large spirited by nature, and began examining the cobbles. In an incredibly short time, as is always the case when a man strikes a match and holds it to the ground, the street swarmed with people. I don't know where they came from. They were not around when we needed them, and they all began hunting with us in a vague way, quite ready to accept whatever the search yielded. One man, however, was braver, and asked John for what he was seeking. I had feared this, yet dumbly hoped for it, mindful of the recent slur upon my sex, for it embarrassed John, not knowing himself what he was seeking, and he stammered and simpered, and jerked out something airily about "just looking for a friend.”

This statement created a great deal of ill-concealed merriment, and when I found the ring he started to prove to that "aggregation of Allobrogi” that he had a friend and a lost friend, and if he couldn't find him by striking matches, he would see what the power of the human voice could do. Then began his walking through the wide street of the Priory, making horrible the quiet of the night by loud halloas and cries of "Douglas Warwick," and sometimes other expressions not dignified, but quite as impressive to the inhabitants of Narni, who, following in our wake, little wotted the import of his words.

“Come out, you shine!" bellowed John as he reached the piazza. "Answer, doggone you!" "I suppose you think you're cute!" he launched successively, and lashed himself into further vituperation.

I aided a little. "Mr. Warwick, are you killed?" I called three times distinctly, and the third time I was quite sure I had a reply. It was way off, but as I told John, it was more than he had received with all of his abuse.

"That's the only way to get at him," he answered wildly. "If I'll insult him, he'll have to come out to fight me. He's