you dreaming away the daylight here? I left all the others in the guard-room, preparing for a right merry game of hide-and-seek. Surely you are not fancying the sport too childish for your years? Foolish boy! The Duke of York is older than you, and has too much sense to be ashamed of amusing his little brother. Off with you, sir, and let me hear no more such hard speeches to my little Alice again. It is but a poor way of keeping up your dignity to be rough with a babe like that.'

To question his father's commands, or even reply to them, never entered Maurice's head for a moment, and he accordingly obeyed at once, slightly ashamed of his outbreak to the unoffending Alice, and determined at any rate to make his peace with her, but feeling ill-used and indignant at his father's comparison between the Duke of York's behaviour and his own, when he thought of the message which had aroused his indignation. Some of his resentment was soothed by Rosamond, who greeted him with a face which brightened considerably at his approach. Alice had been pouring her grievances into her cousin's ears, and Rose ran up at once to Maurice, saying

'Oh! I am so glad you are come! I thought Alice must have made some mistake in the message, or you would not have been so angry. We all want you so much.'

'Oh yes!' cried Prince Harry, seizing Maurice's hand and dragging him along. Now we are all ready. Come, James; come, Bessie; let us begin directly.'

The Game of Hide-and-Seek.

143

'Ah! Maurice, here you are at last!' said James, carelessly throwing down his book and rising from his seat. 'Well, Harry, I am quite ready. What place shall we have for home, and who shall hide first?'

The game began at once, and was carried on with great spirit; Maurice, whose anger seldom lasted long, finding his wrath gradually evaporate under the exciting influence of the game. It was his nature to put heart and soul into whatever he was doing; and, before long, he was eagerly conducting a search for the Duke of York, who proved to be an adept in the art of concealing himself. He had threatened to hide where they should take half an hour at the least to find him, and he kept his word. But it was Maurice who first saw the tapestry shake in one of the ante-rooms to the presence-chamber; it was Maurice whose warning shout at this ghostly appearance came just in time to send his panicstricken companions flying towards 'home.' Moreover, when Anne Thistlewood, standing silent and motionless behind one of the old suits of armour propped against the wall of the long dim corridor, looked so like a 'real goblin,' as Alice said, that the little girl gave vent to a scream of unfeigned terror, it was Maurice who caught her in his arms, and (even with this additional burden) outstripped Mistress Anne's nimble feet, and bore her triumphantly home in safety. The game did him good in more ways than one; and, when the increasing darkness had put an end to it, and the younger

children had been summoned to bed by their respective attendants, he claimed Rosamond for one of those confidential 'talks' which somehow during the last two or three months had been of rarer and rarer occurrence. This fact struck Maurice himself as he established her in his favourite window-seat in their own apartments; and he said reproachfully, 'I don't know how it is, Rose, but whenever I want you now, you are always obliged to go to the Princess's rooms. I never have you to myself at all; and when you are talking to me, you look as if your brains were busy about something different from what you are saying. If you desert me, I shall have no companion but the two little wenches, who are scarce more than babies, and can talk of nought but their puppets and their games.'

Oh! Maurice,' cried poor Rosamond, much more impressed by this affecting representation than she would have been if Maurice had given her a downright scolding-a proceeding in which he had sometimes indulged in the old days at home-'how can you think I want to desert you? But how am I to help being in the Princess's rooms, when her Highness asks me to sup or breakfast with her?'

'Yes; and how often do you sup there?' pursued Maurice, his various grievances gradually returning to his memory as he spoke. Verily, I

believe, five days out of the seven.'

'Oh no! surely not so often. I have not tonight, you see.'