ent.

[A long and animated discussion ensues. This particular
subject never fails to provoke a tremendous argument.

(_A few minutes later._)

_Second Sp._ (_to the host_). What was the bag to-day, CHALMERS?

_Chalmers._ A hundred and forty-five pheasants, fifty-six rabbits,
eleven hares, three pigeons, and a woodcock. We should have got a
hundred and eighty pheasants if they hadn't dodged us in the big wood. I
can't make out where they went.

_Second Sp._ It's a deuced difficult wood to beat, that is. I thought we
should have got more hares, all the same.

_Chalmers._ Hares! I think I'm precious lucky to get so many nowadays.
There won't be a hare left in a year or two.

(_The discussion proceeds._)

_Third Sp._ How's old JOHNNY RAIKES shooting this year? I never saw such
a chap for rocketers. They can't escape him.

_Chalmers._ I asked him to-day, but he couldn't come. I think for
pheasants he's quite the best shot in England. Nobody can beat him at
that game.

_Fourth Sp._ Hasn't he got some row or other on with =Crackside=?

_Chalmers._ Yes. That makes fourteen rows =Crackside= has got going on
all at once. He seems to revel in them. His latest move was to refuse to
pay tithe, and when the parson levied a distress, he made all his
tenants drunk and walked at their head blowing a post-horn. He's as mad
as a hatter.

So there you have a sample conversation, sketched in outline. You will
find it accurate enough. All you have to do is to select for yourself
the part you mean to play in it.

* * * * *

Something to Live For.

(_From the Literary Club Smoking-room._)

_Cynicus._ I'm waiting till my friends are dead, in
order to write My Reminiscences?

_Amicus._ Ah, but remember, "_De mortuis nil nisi
bonum._"

_Cynicus._ Quite so. I shall tell nothing but
exceedingly good stories about them.

* * * * *

SO LIKE HER!--"I can never trust him," said Mrs. R.,
alluding to a friend of hers, who considered himself
well up in SHAKSPEARE, "because I've found out before
now that he gargles his quotations."

NOTE.--"The Man who Would," _will_ appear next week. No. IV.

* * * * *

[Illustration:
=THE RHODES COLOSSUS=

STRIDING FROM CAPE TOWN TO CAIRO.]

* * * * *

THE RHODES COLOSSUS.

["Mr.