--five including yourself."

"My dear Francesca," I said, "how charming you are to count me as a
child! I shall really begin to feel as if there were golden threads
among the silver."

"Tut-tut," she said, "you're not so grey as all that."

"Yes, I am," I said, "quite as grey as all that and much greyer; only we
don't talk about it."

"But we _do_ talk about sunflowers," she said, "don't we?"

"If you'll promise to have the beastly glaring things dug up--"

"Not," she said, "before we've extracted from them their last pip of
chicken-food."

"Well, anyhow," I said, "as soon as possible. If you'll promise to do
that I'll promise never to mention them again."

"But you'll lose your reputation with the Generals and Colonels."

"I don't mind that," I said, "if I can only rid the garden of their
detested presence."

"My golden-threaded boy," said Francesca, "it shall be as you desire."

R.C.L.

* * * * *

CONSTABLE JINKS.

Our village policeman is tall and well-grown,
He stands six feet two and he weighs sixteen stone;
His gait is majestic, his visage serene,
And his boots are the biggest that ever I've seen.

Fame sealed his renown with a definite stamp
When two German waiters escaped from a camp.
Unaided he captured those runaway Huns
Who had lived for a week on three half-penny buns.

When a derelict porpoise was cast on the shore
Our village policeman was much to the fore;
He measured the beast from its tip to its tail,
And blandly pronounced it "an undersized whale."

When a small boy was flying his kite on the links
It was promptly impounded by Constable Jinks,
Who astutely remarked that it might have been seen
By the vigilant crew of a Hun submarine.

It is sometimes alleged that great valour he showed
When he chased a mad cow for three miles on the road;
But there's also another account of the hunt
With a four-legged pursuer, a biped in front.

If your house has been robbed and his counsel you seek
He's sure to look in--in the course of the week,
When his massive appearance will comfort your cook,
Though he fails in the bringing of culprits to book.

His _obiter dicta_ on life and the law
Set our ribald young folk in a frequent guffaw;
But the elders repose an implicit belief
In so splendid a product of beer and of beef.

He's the strongest and solidest man in the place,
Nothing--short of mad cat