"He! he he! he! he!"-and Mr Hochytoch also began to laugh.

"Most inconceivable !!! O, what would I not give to have Sir James or Lady Methodical here just now !-but I should lose my judgment long before I should have time to send forGracious, another set of skirls! I think I had better begin and laugh too-pray, join me, Mrs Dudd."

"He! he he! he he!-ha! ha! ho! ho!!! He! he he! he! he! ha! ha!-ha!"-stop! In the gap which the self-dismissed page had left in the folding doors, stood, till now unnoticed, Colonel Brown. Underneath one shoulder, his daughter Cecilia,-the hat of her French governess under the other. And face to face, but somewhat in the shade, Mrs Horn Regular and Lady Methodical.

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Upon my word, this is really a scene!" and looking round in strange surprise, Colonel Brown, leading on his ambuscade battalion, now ventured to enter, though certainly with some reluctance, upon the field of action.

The withering aspect of this force, even when seen from a distance, drove Miss Kicklecackle from her station at the window; Mr Hochytoch and Mrs Dudd from the room; brought two half-demolished drumsticks to the ground, and Mrs Fife to her senses.-The screams of Willie, who had likewise been infected, resounding like a trumpet of victory in some of the adjoining landing-places, completed the enchantment.

Colonel Brown now waited, with no slight degree of satisfaction at finding himself a means in dissolving the show, to be enlightened; and his party, mechanically adopting the same method of obtaining information, looked up to him in silence.

Mrs Fife, however, notwithstanding this second, and, perhaps of the two, the worst pull upon her nerves, did not at all times respect Colonel Brown agreeably to his desires; and she began, once more, to laugh over the scene which she herself had so lately helped to conjure up.

"Well, ladies! this is a most extraordinary reception," said Colonel Brown; and Colonel

Lady Methodical hemmed, and turned to Mrs Horn Regular.

Mrs Horn Regular re-echoed her Ladyship's hem, and fixed her still quiet eyes upon the French gouvernante.

That lady gave a pathetic shrug, accompanied by a short low squeel, and applied her handkerchief to her face to conceal the love of happy frolic, which, maugre the dignity of her companions, already danced there in glee.

Miss Brown was the first to take up the

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cudgels. My dear Mrs Fife, who were these odd creatures now?" she exclaimed, with a pouting lip.

"I really don't know," replied Mrs Fife; and she wiped away a tear-not, we may guess, in sorrow.

"No?"

"No; it was-but pray be seated all of youit was only a parcel of people I permitted to see the house."

"Well ?"

"And they-O dear! I shall never-he! he-recover it!"

"Well?" The well was sounded this time by Colonel Brown, and his company at large. "And they came, as I said, to see the house." "Strange!" said Miss Brown, who did not think so very much of Fife-hall as to imagine that any body should go to see it.

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Strange! The strangest adventure, my dear, you ever heard of in your life.”

"But you know them, don't you? you know everybody, Mrs Fife.”

"My dear, I was so confounded, I did not even get one, even one poor silly inquiry made." "Impostors, perhaps," said Lady Methodical.

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They must have been very amusing ones, I should think," said Mrs Horn Regular. "A part of the character, perhaps. Hem!" added Lady Methodical.

"If I could only find them out !" cried Mrs Fife.

"Hush!" interrupted Colonel Brown, as his daughter and another of the party were going to say something fierce with contempt for the

members now at the horn. "Is there no chance, my dear Mrs Fife, of our becoming better acquainted with these oddities?"

"Do you think by going after them I should be able to overtake them, Colonel ?" re-interrogated Mrs Fife.

"Why, I should almost think so;" slowly answered Colonel Brown, taking his breath, and also his revenge, in having once more settled her upon tenter-hooks.

"They are going to St Andrews:"-Mrs Fife had been informed of that piece of programme before the party had altogether alighted at her door-" And I shall go there to-morrow; nay, this instant. But perhaps I shall catch them at the gate;-pray ring, Miss Brown.

While Miss Brown was preparing, with all lady-like grace and decorum to obey this rather unwelcome summons, Mrs. Fife was on her way, in person, to issue out the necessary commands. She reflected, however, on the feebleness of her powers either to detain or to interfere any further in the motions of the punchinellos; but, still bent upon a better acquain