“Hard taps; they was silver taps,” ejaculated Cook, “and drawed gallings and gallings—­and nothing to laugh at, Master Dammicles, neether....  So don’t you drink no more, Miss Lucy.”

“I can’t,” admitted Lucille—­and indeed, to Dam, who regarded his “cousin” with considerable concern, it did seem that, even as Cook’s poor young sister of unhappy memory, Lucille had “swole”—­though only locally.

“Does beer make you swell or swole or swellow when you swallow, Cooker?” he inquired; “because, if so, you had better be—­” but he was not allowed to conclude his deduction, for cook, bridling, bristling, and incensed, bore down upon the children and swept them from her kitchen.

To the boy, even as he fled via a dish of tartlets and cakes, it seemed remarkable that a certain uncertainty of temper (and figure) should invariably distinguish those who devote their lives to the obviously charming and attractive pursuit of the culinary art.

Surely one who, by reason of unfortunate limitations of sex, age, ability, or property, could not become a Colonel of Cavalry could still find infinite compensation in the career of cook or railway-servant.

Imagine, in the one case, having absolute freedom of action with regard to raisins, tarts, cream, candy-peel, jam, plum-puddings and cakes, making life one vast hamper, and in the other case, boundless opportunity in the matter of leaping on and off moving trains, carrying lighted bull’s-eye lanterns, and waving flags.

One of the early lessons that life taught him, without troubling to explain them, and she taught him many and cruel, was that Cooks are Cross.

“What shall we do now, Dam?” asked Lucille, and added, “Let’s raid the rotten nursery and rag the Haddock.  Little ass!  Nothing else to do.  How I hate Sunday afternoon....  No work and no play.  Rotten.”

The Haddock, it may be stated, owed his fishy title to the fact that he once possessed a Wealthy Relative of the name of Haddon.  With far-sighted reversionary intent his mother, a Mrs. Berners nee Seymour Stukeley, had christened him Haddon.

But the Wealthy Relative, on being informed of his good fortune, had bluntly replied that he intended to leave his little all to the founding of Night-Schools for illiterate Members of Parliament, Travelling-Scholarships for uneducated Cabinet Ministers, and Deportment Classes for New Radical Peers.  He was a Funny Man as well as a Wealthy Relative.

And, thereafter, Haddon Berners’ parents had, as Cook put it, “up and died” and “Grandfather” had sent for, and adopted, the orphan Haddock.

Though known to Dam and Lucille as “The Haddock” he was in reality an utter Rabbit and esteemed as such.  A Rabbit he was born, a Rabbit he lived, and a Rabbit he died.  Respectable ever.  Seen in the Right Place, in the Right Clothes, doing the Right Thing with the Right People at the Right Time.