"Well," she said, when they awoke in the the morning, "what do you advise?” "I advise exactly the punishment which her adorer will receive this morning. Let one of your servant-maids the strongest you can select-give her a dozen strokes with that oldfashioned torturer the rod of birch. As the adventure and its punishment are sure to be known, a few of the elder girls might be present. You can lecture her a little on her naughtiness before the expiation." Madame Simonet obeyed. The verdict of the dormitories that evening was-Served her right. CHAPTER VIII. A COUNCIL OF FOUR. "Strange are the deeds in the Odyssey done, ILCHESTER market-day is Thursday. SIL There is an old-fashioned custom in many country towns-declining rapidly-of the resident gentlemen coming down to the weekly market to purchase anything choice, and to chat together. It is a favourite custom in the Channel Islands, our last fragment of France, which give the Queen of England seisin of the Duchy of Normandy. There, a few years ago, and maybe even now, the market-place was the chief place for gossip. Early in the morning everybody was looking for fresh fish, lobsters, fruit, which were wondrous cheap in those old times, before Victor Hugo lived in Hauteville, and the Bailiff was knighted, and the most brilliant Principal Elizabeth College ever had was teaching beneath the Southern Cross. Silchester market-place, though not so vast as that of Nottingham, had space enough for stalls of fish, fruit, flowers. There was even an itinerant vendor of books who came punctually every week, and who had sometimes picked up a volume worth purchase-though he could hardly read himself. It was a frequent meeting-place of the inhabitants; there was always a stir in the arena, for the farmers came to sell their wheat. Of course there was an "ordinary" at the Silchester Arms. Now and then the Squire himself would drive down with his son and daughter, just to have an opportunity of talking to his tenants; and when this was the case, he invariably took a glass of sherry at the Silchester Arms, and went to lunch with the Rector. He had come oftener since Louisa had grown magnetic. On this special Thursday, four gentlemen strolled around the market-place together. The Rector, thoughtful and absent, was armin-arm with the Rev. Doctor Harris, widestawake of pedagogues; while Doctor Sterne walked with Monsieur Simonet, one with inevitable spectacles, the other with an inevitable cigar. They came to the most famous fishstall, whose owner, Stevenson, was a humorist in his way. "What fish have you got that's eatable?" asked Doctor Harris, who liked his little dinner after classics and mathematics were dismissed. "Do you see that salmon, Doctor?" said Stevenson. "It was brought me by a strange fisherman, who declared he caught it in a pool on Ranscomb. I did not believe him; but I bought it." "By no means part with it," said Sterne. "Eat it yourself: Monsieur Simonet will give you a cucumber, I am sure. Don't you know the proverb- Every salmon caught on Ranscomb has swallowed a diamond'?" The Doctor talked so gravely that Stevenson looked puzzled. Simonet said, "You should explain to him, Doctor, that the diamond in the salmon's stomach is the diamant digestif." "Well, I shall buy the fish," said Harris, "and a lobster for sauce: here is a beauty." "Then I'll send a cucumber to you instead of Stevenson," said Simonet. “I bet you a cigar that I send you one longer than your salmon." "I hope there will be a diamant digestif in the cucumber as well," said Doctor Sterne. "Come and dine with me, and try. Will you come and taste your own Cucurbita citrullus, Monsieur Simonet? And you, Saint Osyth ?" "It's a great temptation to eat cucumber in |