The equestrians were obliged to walk down the hill, and when they reached the bottom David was going as the crow flies across some meadows half a mile ahead.  A good canter soon brought them on a line with him, but every now and then the turns of the road and the hills gave him an advantage.  Lucy, naturally kind-hearted, would have relaxed her pace to make the race more equal, but Talboys urged her on; and as a horse is, after all, a faster animal than a sailor, they rode in at the front gate while David was still two fields off.

“Come,” said Mrs. Bazalgette, regretfully, “we have beat him, poor fellow, but we won’t go in till we see what has become of him.”

As they loitered on the lawn, Henry the footman came out with a salver, and on it reposed a soiled note.  Henry presented it with demure obsequiousness, then retired grinning furtively.

“What is this—­a begging-letter?  What a vile hand!  Look, Lucy; did you ever?  Why, it must be some pauper.”

“Have a little mercy, aunt,” said Lucy, piteously; “that hand has been formed under my care and daily superintendence:  it is Reginald’s.”

“Oh, that alters the case.  What can the dear child have to say to me!  Ah! the little wretch!  Send the servants after him in every direction.  Oh, who would be a mother!”

The letter was written in lines with two pernicious defects. 1st.  They were like the wooden part of a bow instead of its string. 2d.  They yielded to gravity—­kept tending down, down, to the righthand corner more and more.  In the use of capitals the writer had taken the copyhead as his model.  The style, however, was pithy, and in writing that is the first Christian grace—­no, I forgot, it is the second; pellucidity is the first.

“Dear mama, me and johnny
Cristmas are gone to the north
Pole his unkle went twise we
Shall be back in siks munths
Please give my love to lucy and
Papa and ask lucy to be kind to
My ginnipigs i shall want them
Wen i come back. too much
Cabiges is not good for ginnipigs. 
Wen i come back i hope there
Will be no rise left. it is very
Unjust to give me those nasty
Messy pudens i am not a child
There filthy there abbommanabel. 
Johny says it is funy at the north
Pole and there are bares
and they
Are wite. 
“I remain

“Your duteful son
“Reginald George Bazalgette.”

This innocent missive set house and premises in an uproar.  Henry was sent east through the dirt, multa reluctantem, in white stockings.  Tom galloped north.  Mrs. Bazalgette sat in the hall, and did well-bred hysterics for Kenealy and Talboys.  Lucy pinned up her habit, and ran to the boundary hedge on the bare chance of seeing the figures of the truants somewhere short of the horizon.  Lo, and behold, there was David Dodd crossing the very nearest field and coming toward her, an urchin in each hand.

Lucy ran to meet them.  “Oh, you dear naughty children, what a fright you have given us!  Oh, Mr. Dodd, how good of you!  Where did you find them?”