"You'll be settin' the 'ouse on fire, Mr. Netlips, I'm afraid," said Mrs. Frost, severely, putting her arms akimbo, and sniffing at the board as though she could smell the spirit it proclaimed--"You don't know nothink about petrol! An' we ain't goin' to have motor-cars often 'ere, please the Lord's goodness!"

Mr. Netlips smiled a superior smile.

"My good woman,"--he said, with his most magisterial air--"if you will kindly manage your own business, which is that of pruning the olive and uprooting the vine, and leave me to manage my establishment as the reversible movement of the age requires, it will be better for the equanimity of the gastritis."

"Good Lord!" and Mrs. Frost threw up her hands--"You're a fine sort of man for a grocer, with your reversibles and your gastritis! What in the world are you talking about?"

Mr. Netlips, busy with the unpacking of a special Stilton cheese which he was about to send 'up to the Manor,' waved her away with one hand.

"I am talking above your head altogther, Mrs. Frost,"--he said, placidly--"I know it! I am aware that my consonances do not tympanise on your brain. Good afternoon!"

"Petrol Stored Here!"--said Bainton, standing squat before the announcement, as he returned from his day's work--"Hor-hor-hor! Hor- hor! I say, Mr. Netlips, don't blow us all into the middle of next week. Where does ye store it? Out in the coal-shed? It's awful 'spensive, ain't it?"