"So you think," grumbled my friend. "If
you were but to know the relief it is to me,
when the Beaver is taken down for its daily
' Constitutional,' you would think differently.
Why, if I did not miss it, bodily, I should
know it was gone, by the way the children
come bounding and springing into the hall,
and darting up to me; or by seeing old Nelson
scamper across into the drawing-room with
his muddy paws."

"But, to whom does it belong?" I insisted.

"Why, I tell you," answered the old Stand,
gruffly, "it belongs to Aunt.' " (I positively
affirm that he had never told me anything of
the kind: but let that pass.)

"What do you think Harry did one day?"
pursued friend. "He stuck it up at the
top of all (where, between ourselves, I have
no doubt it will establish itself some day) and
then he called Katie and Minnie to come and
bow down before Gesler's hat. Minnie looked
terrified and kept watching ' Aunt's' door—
it opens on the staircase, that she may come
out at odd times and glare at us, to see what
we are all about. Katie tossed her black
locks, and said she did not care who came out,
for she supposed Harry might put the things
where he pleased in his own mother's hall.
There they stood, such a pretty group of
rebels on a small scale, looking up at me!
And do you know what those good-for-nothing
little conspirators planned next day? Harry
had a scarlet fez among his hoards, and they
pinched it into a Cap of Liberty, and perched
it up here immediately, over the Beaver. But
William chanced to come down first to
breakfast that morning, and he looked grave, and
took it off, and said, 'that wasn't the way to
go to work'. Harry and Katie, who had been
dodging about, watching for some one else,
looked rather disconcerted, but by no means
cross, for they always listen to William; and
dear old William is sure to be right".

For some time after this, I detected no
great change in the expression of my
Mahogany Friend, and he volunteered no new
confidences. Sometimes, best hats went away;
but, then, the home hats that still lingered
gave a promise of return. The grim Beaver
went on towering; the Cottage went on
nestling; the two sets of feathers went on
waving about, all much as usual, until
William's hat went away, and staid away
longer than usual. When it returned, it had
rather a different look about it; and, not long
after its return, came a strange straw hat,
a Swiss hat, such as ladies (not peasants) wear
in their excursions through Switzerland. It
was a good hat, I dare say; indeed I know it
was, because William said it was; but, to me,
it looked strange at the Chase, and I am an old
man and do not like what is strange. It
always hung next to William's—very close
indeed—and the two hats always went out
and came in at the same time. At last, the
Swiss hat flapped away, and, what was worse
for all of us, William's soon followed it, and
since that day that corner of the old Hatstand
has had rather a desolate look, and the
poor Cottage has never been the same; no, nor
the Chase; no, nor the country round about.
George's Eton cap, indeed, hung manfully by
the Cottage in the holidays, but holidays do
not last all the year; and Tom's little
tarpaulin was soon on blue water, as my Mahogany
Friend (grown taciturn) informed me
in expressive  pantomine, by holding out his
bare arm.

I went away too, much about the same
time—not that I was much loss, though Katie
did cry when I told her I was going. A
threatening of my old complaint drove me
across the alps; no unpleasant drive either!

On my return, I found great changes in my
Mahogany Friend. The Beaver had established
itself much higher, immediately over the
Cottage. My old friend informed me that,
during my absence, Katie's and Harry's
hat would sometimes approach it, or little
Minnie's straw would creep coaxingly up to it;
but, that the moment the Beaver took this
stride, all the smaller tribe flew off at a
tangent, and there the Beaver remained in
triumph, towering over its poor meek
neighbour, the Cottage, whose blue ribbon was all
faded and discoloured. The other side of the
Stand was changed, too, and I felt rather
perplexed and uneasy at the species of confusion
I saw there. The neutralizing influence of
the twins, and their inseparable companion,
was removed to some school in France, I
believe. As to Harry, he must have been a
real Hydra if he could wear all those hats and
caps. Besides my old friends, there was an
Oxford boating hat, and a velvet hunting
cap, and a steeple-chase jockey cap, and a
German travelling cap, and goodness knows
how many more. Round about, like satellites,
hung all manner of bad imitations in the
shape of visiting hats and caps, with all the
reckless look and none of the genuine air of
Harry's head-gear. In the midst of these, I
searched anxiously for the girls', my girls'
hats; Minnie's, I say, had betaken itself
into a little shy corner, and remained aloof
with a sort of scared look. But, Katie's, of
course that was there, in the very midst of the
throng—not quite so close to Harry's as usual,
because it hung on the same branch with a
dark blue foraging cap.

Now, when this cap caught my eye, I
understood a good deal, because I am in the
habit of understanding what I see; but
certainly, I never anticipated all the trouble
that foraging cap was destined to give me.
The lectures I should have to throw away,
the confessions I should be doomed to listen to,
the tears and prayers I should have to
withstand—or to fancy I withstood; the early
and late walks with Kate it would cost me,
when it would have been much more
comfortable and respectable, at my time of life,
to have been, either in bed, or sitting over
the fire in my own chimney corner.