e manifestations
have been observed. After that it will be plain sailing. You will
continue to call, always supplying fresh suggestion, until at last,
thoroughly unnerved, the tenant will bolt, probably taking refuge in
a hotel. That will be your chance. Snatch the place up at once, and
there you are."

For the first time since he was demobilised, Higgins smiled.

"By Heavens!" he said, "I'll try it. There's a little place at Croydon
which would be a perfect billet. I will pay my first visit at once."

He sauntered away, proclaiming in song the satisfactory condition of
rose-culture in Picardy.

Yesterday he came back.

His face was grim. There was a light in his eye which I did not like.
He made no mention of roses blooming in Picardy or anywhere else.

"How is the scheme working?" I asked. "Have you called on the Croydon
gentleman?"

"I have," he answered; "and when I had laid the blessed ground-bait,
as you call it, he told me he always did think there was a ghost about
the place, and he was delighted to have his theory confirmed. He wants
more details now. He invites me to furnish evidence. What for, you
ask? Well, you see, he happens to be an active member of the Society
for Psychical Research."

* * * * *

[Illustration: _Polite Stranger (during the busy hour on the
Underground_). "WON'T YOU SHARE MY HANDLE, MADAM?"]

* * * * *

SILLY SEASONING.

The strange case of the halibut and the cormorant, recently reported
in the daily Press, has brought us a budget of interesting letters,
from which we select the following as agreeable evidence of the return
of normal conditions in the fish-story-telling industry:--

_Gullane, N.B._

Dear Sir,--One of the most striking results of the War has been
its effect on the mentality of birds and animals and even fishes.
The papers have lately contained accounts of a halibut which
swallowed a cormorant and survived the exploit only to fall a
victim to the wiles of a North Sea fisherman. As the cormorant
is generally regarded to be the _dernier cri_ in voracity, the
incident illustrates the old saying of the biter bit. As a rule
birds of prey have the upper hand in their contests with the
finny denizens of the deep. But the triumph of the halibut is not
altogether unprecedented. I remember, when I was cruising in the
China Seas in the year 1854, witnessing a c