"I go to the station-house, ye base south rons!" exclaimed Babie. "Let me see which of you will dare to touch me, and I'll knock down all the figures near me; and as I have not ony siller aboot me, you'll be losers, I can tell you, after a'..."

The men knew not what to do; Babie stood like a lioness at bay-her eyes flashing; her black velvet cap in the skirmish had got over one eye, and there was something in her fiery look that paralysed the two men, accustomed to the immobile expression and deadly stillness of the wax figures.

At this moment, Ellen came up. Babie vehemently related her story, the men as vehemently told theirs. It seemed that Babie, after a long sojourn in the gallery, had paid an extra sixpence to go into the "Chamber of Horrors;" there she was at first childishly delighted, but being quite alone, in a little while a sort of vague alarm took possession of herthe revolutionary Marat, represented as dying with a knife stuck into his breast, seemed to open his glazed eyes as she bent over him, and

poor old Count de l'Orme, who, in an oubliette of the Bastille, had forgotten himself into idiocy, and when at length set free, had slunk back there to die seemed, as she turned round, to shake his shaggy, savage head at her.

Fanciful as a child, Babie uttered a loud shriek, and rushed out of the Chamber of Horrors as she did so, she came in contact with a figure, which she knocked down. Her shriek, and the noise of the fall, caught the ears of the attendants, who were at hand. They raised the image, discovered that the arm only was broken, and required a sum which Babie refused to pay-not without reason, for she had given her last sixpence to get into the" Chamber of Horrors."

Ellen saw that the demand was just, and not desiring to be taken as Babie's friend to the station-house, and made to figure in so absurd a story in all the papers, she paid the required sum-Babie declaring the while that "she could na thank her, nor consider hersel in her debt for it; it was just encouraging im

position, for if people chose to exhibit things to frighten folk out of their wits, they must tak the consequences."

When they got down stairs, Babie, who had not thought any apology necessary for having detained the carriage, or for the accident it had met with, was with great consequence about to seat herself in it, but Ellen interposed, explaining that, being damaged, it had better go home unoccupied, and remarking that she herself was going in a hackney-coach.

"And in what manner am I to gang hame, Miss Lindsay?" asked the somewhat offended Babie; "after luring me out, I suppose you're not going to propose my walking hame? But I canna and I wunna; I have a warld of bargains in the coach, and if I canna gang in that, I must come in yours. It's seldom a Douglas has been reduced to ony carriage but her ain ; my grandmother drove about in her coach and six; and if I had na thought I was welcome to the use of your carriage, and that you were vary glad to sit the while wi' Grizzy, I'd never have sat mysel in it at a'."

Ellen, very anxious to get rid of her, replied,

"You were most welcome, and I was going to beg you, Miss Babie, as I am much hurried, to let me see you into a coach on my account, as you honour me by considering yourself my guest, and as this accident, which is no fault of mine, renders the carriage unsafe."

Weel, I have na objection to that." Just then a very showy blazoned patent safety cab passed by, and the driver hailed Babie. like the luke of that conveyance weel enoo," said Babie. "Mak a bargain wi' him, my dear, not only to tak me hame, but to tak me to the Zoological Gardens. And I'll trouble you to lend me a shilling, for I've spent a' my siller in the city, but I've got my pennyworth for my penny, I'm thinking."

Ellen lent Babie half-a-crown, and paid the cabman his fare in advance. She then took leave of Babie, trusting that in a patent safety cab she could come to no harm, and strongly recommending her not to go too near the monkeys, the cockatoos, or in short any of the

animals in the Zoological Gardens; she would fain have persuaded her not to go, but Babie, as her sister had said, was mad after any kind of gaiety; and, full of spirits, she drove away.

"That's a reg'lar queer un, my lady, is that ere old forriner," said fighting Jem. "She on't see nothing at the Zoological Gardins half so outlandish as herself."

Ellen laughed, for she thought so too. She bade Jem drive her to St. James's Square, causing her uncle's carriage to follow, lest its preceding her should cause any alarm.

She found her absence had caused much surprise; but the horses escaped unhurt, and the footman had arrived from the Saracen's Head but little injured.

Mr. Lindsay was the first to laugh at Ellen's ludicrous account of her morning's adventures, and those of the "flighty, flauntering lassie, Babie." As for fighting Jem, having not only received his fare, and an extra half-crown, but a good luncheon, he decided that Ellen "wor reg'lar tip-top gentry, and he only wished he could meet wi' such a cus