es. Displaced semilunar cartilage, and a three
months' job. The man's worth thirty-five shillings a week. And there!
I'm hanged if the woman with the rheumatic arthritis isn't round in
her bath-chair again. She's all sealskin and lactic acid. It's simply
sickening to see how they crowd to that man. And such a man! You haven't
seen him. All the better for you. I don't know what the devil you are
laughing at, Munro. I can't see where the fun comes in myself."

Well, it was a short experience that visit to Avonmouth, but I think
that I shall remember it all my life. Goodness knows, you must be sick
enough of the subject, but when I started with so much detail I was
tempted to go. It ended by my going back again in the afternoon,
Cullingworth assuring me that he would call his creditors together as
I had advised, and that he would let me know the result in a few days.
Mrs. C. would hardly shake hands with me when I said goodbye; but I like
her the better for that. He must have a great deal of good in him, or he
could not have won her love and confidence so completely. Perhaps there
is another Cullingworth behind the scenes--a softer, tenderer man, who
can love and invite love. If there is, I have never got near him. And
yet I may only have been tapping at the shell. Who knows? For that
matter, it is likely enough that he has never got at the real Johnnie
Munro. But you have, Bertie; and I think that you've had a little too
much of him this time, only you encourage me to this sort of excess by
your sympathetic replies. Well, I've done as much as the General Post
Office will carry for fivepence, so I'll conclude by merely remarking
that a fortnight has passed, and that I have had no news from Avonmouth,
which does not in the very slightest degree surprise me. If I ever do
hear anything, which is exceedingly doubtful, you may be sure that I
will put a finish to this long story.

III. HOME, 15th October, 1881.

Without any figure of speech I feel quite ashamed when I think of you,
Bertie. I send you one or two enormously long letters, burdened, as far
as I can remember them, with all sorts of useless detail. Then, in spite
of your kindly answers and your sympathy, which I have done so little to
deserve, I drop you completely for more than six months. By this J pen
I swear that it shall not happen again; and this letter may serve to
bridge the gap and to bring you up to date in my poor affairs, in which,
of all outer m