An apparition in black and white - His Majesty the King could hardly see distinctly - lifted him up to the level of the table, and felt his wrists and forehead. The water came, and he drank deeply, his teeth chattering against the edge of the tumbler. Then every one seemed to go away - every one except the huge man in black and white, who carried him back to his bed; the mother and father following. And the sin of the "'parkle cwown" rushed back and took possession of the terrified soul.

"I'm a fief!" he gasped. "I want to tell Miss Biddums vat I'm a fief. Vere is Miss Biddums?"

Miss Biddums had come and was bending over him. "I'm a fief,” he whispered. “A fieflike ve men in the pwison. But I'll tell now. I tookt I tookt ve 'parkle

cwown when the man that came left it in ve

hall. I bwoke ve paper and ve little bwown box, and it looked shiny, and I took it to It's in ve dooly

play wif, and I was afwaid. It's in ve

box at ve bottom. No one never asked for

it, but I was afwaid. Oh, go an' get ve dooly-box!"

Miss Biddums obediently stooped to the lowest shelf of the almirah and unearthed the big paper box in which His Majesty the King kept his dearest possessions. Under the tin soldiers, and a layer of mud pellets for a pellet-bow, winked and blazed a diamond star, wrapped roughly in a halfsheet of note-paper whereon were a few words.

Somebody was crying at the head of the bed, and a man's hand touched the forehead of His Majesty the King, who grasped the packet and spread it on the bed.

"Vat is ve 'parkle cwown," he said and wept bitterly; for now that he had made restitution he would fain have kept the shining splendor with him.

"It concerns you too," said a voice at the head of the bed. "Read the note. This is not the time to keep back anything."

The note was curt, very much to the point, and signed by a single initial. “If

you wear this to-morrow night I shall know what to expect." The date was three weeks old..

A whisper followed, and the deeper voice returned: -" And you drifted as far apart as that! I think it makes us quits now, doesn't it? Oh, can't we drop this folly once and for all? Is it worth it, darling?"

"Kiss me too," said His Majesty the King, dreamily. "You isn't vevy angwy, is you?"

The fever burned itself out, and His Majesty the King slept.

When he waked, it was in a new world -peopled by his father and mother as well as Miss Biddums: and there was much love in that world and no morsel of fear, and more petting than was good for several little boys. His Majesty the King was too young to moralize on the uncertainty of things human, or he would have been impressed with the singular advantages of crime ay, black sin. Behold, he had stolen the "'parkle cwown," and his reward was Love,

and the right to play in the waste-paper basket under the table "for always."

He trotted over to spend an afternoon with Patsie, and the Commissioner's wife would have kissed him. "No, not vere," said His Majesty the King, with superb insolence, fencing one corner of his mouth with his hand.

"Vat's my Mamma's place

she kisses me."

vere

Oh!" said the Commissioner's wife

briefly. Then to herself: “

Well, I sup

pose I ought to be glad for his sake. Children are selfish little grubs and - I've got my Patsie."

THE DRUMS OF THE FORE AND AFT.

"AND a little child shall lead them."

In the Army List they still stand as "The Fore and Fit Princess Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen-Auspach's Merther-Tydfilshire Own Royal Loyal Light Infantry, Regimental District 329A," but the Army through all its barracks and canteens knows them now as the "Fore and Aft." They may in time do something that shall make their new title honorable, but at present they are bitterly ashamed, and the man who calls them "Fore and Aft" does so at the risk of the head which is on his shoulders.

Two words breathed into the stables of a

certain Cavalry Regiment will bring the men out into the streets with belts and mops and