des, she may not be at all the sort of
foster-mother for a Japanese dwarf-tree....

It will break my heart if Sidney dies now, for I had so looked forward
to celebrating his ninetieth birthday with him. It will hurt Celia too.
But _her_ grief, of course, will be an inferior affair. In fact, a
couple of pairs of silk stockings will help her to forget him
altogether.

THE FINANCIER. I

This is how I became a West African mining magnate with a stake in the
Empire.

During February I grew suddenly tired of waiting for the summer to
begin. London in the summer is a pleasant place, and chiefly so because
you can keep on buying evening papers to see what Kent is doing. In
February life has no such excitements to offer. So I wrote to my
solicitor about it.

"I want you" (I wrote) "to buy me fifty rubber shares, so that I can
watch them go up and down." And I added "Brokerage 1/8" to show that I
knew what I was talking about.

He replied tersely as follows:--

"Don't be a fool. If you have any money to invest I can get you a safe
mortgage at five per cent. Let me know."

It's a funny thing how the minds of solicitors run upon mortgages. If
they would only stop to think for a moment they would see that you
couldn't possibly watch a safe mortgage go up and down. I left my
solicitor alone and consulted Henry on the subject. In the intervals
between golf and golf Henry dabbles in finance.

"You don't want anything gilt-edged, I gather?" he said. It's wonderful
how they talk.

"I want it to go up and down," I explained patiently, and I indicated
the required movement with my umbrella.

"What about a little flutter in oil?" he went on, just like a financier
in a novel.

"I'll have a little flutter in raspberry jam if you like. Anything as
long as I can rush every night for the last edition of the evening
papers and say now and then, 'Good heavens, I'm ruined.'"

"Then you'd better try a gold-mine," said Henry bitterly, in the voice
of one who had tried. "Take your choice," and he threw the paper over to
me.

"I don't want a whole mine--only a vein or two. Yes, this is very
interesting," I went on, as I got among the West Africans. "The scoring
seems to be pretty low; I suppose it must have been a wet wicket. 'H.E.
Reef, 1-3/4, 2'--he did a little better in the second innings. '1/2,
Boffin River, 5/16, 7/16'--they followed on, you see, but they saved the
innings defeat. By the way, which figure do I really k