steak!" she said tragically, "instead, a dungeon shall be your doom. We will let the Duchess remain as a receiver of odds and ends. I suppose her suspicions were excited by the sight of these articles. A rare cat! a learned cat! now please set the table, for our feast will soon be prepared!" and Cyn bent over the sizzling steak, that emitted a most appetizing odor.
Setting that table was no such easy matter as might appear, for what with the big fruit-dish, wooden covers, different sizes of plates and other incongruous articles, considerable management was necessary.
"I shall have to put the sugar on in the bag," Nattie said, incautiously backing to view the general effect, and so stumbling over the saucepan of potatoes that sat on the floor, but luckily doing no damage.
"Ah, well! Eccentricity is quite the rage now, you know," responded the philosophical Cyn, "and certainly, a sugar-bowl so closely resembling a brown paper bag as not to be distinguishable from the real thing, is quite récherché. But my dear Nat, where am I to set the steak if you have that big fruit-dish in the center of the table, taking up all the room?"
"I shall have to put it on the floor, then," Nattie answered, despairingly, "for I have tried it on all parts of the table! If you set it on the edge," she
