gues in the same
spirit as that in which a nurse listens to the outpourings of the
family baby. She was surprised when he said anything sensible enough
for her to understand.

His table being clear of breakfast and his room free from disturbing
influences, the exhilaration caused by his chat with his landlady
left Mr. Garnet. Life seemed very gray to him. He was a conscientious
young man, and he knew that he ought to sit down and do some work. On
the other hand, his brain felt like a cauliflower, and he could not
think what to write about. This is one of the things which sour the
young author even more than do those long envelopes which so
tastefully decorate his table of a morning.

He felt particularly unfitted for writing at that moment. The morning
is not the time for inventive work. An article may be polished then,
or a half-finished story completed, but 11 A.M. is not the hour at
which to invent.

Jerry Garnet wandered restlessly about his sitting room. Rarely had it
seemed so dull and depressing to him as it did then. The photographs
on the mantelpiece irritated him. There was no change in them. They
struck him as the concrete expression of monotony. His eye was caught
by a picture hanging out of the straight. He jerked it to one side,
and the effect became worse. He jerked it back again, and the thing
looked as if it had been hung in a dim light by an astigmatic
drunkard. Five minutes' pulling and hauling brought it back to a
position only a shade less crooked than that in which he had found it,
and by that time his restlessness had grown like a mushroom.

He looked out of the window. The sunlight was playing on the house
opposite. He looked at his boots. At this point conscience prodded him
sharply.

"I won't," he muttered fiercely, "I will work. I'll turn out
something, even if it's the worst rot ever written."

With which admirable sentiment he tracked his blotting pad to its
hiding place (Mrs. Medley found a fresh one every day), collected ink
and pens, and sat down.

There was a distant thud from above, and shortly afterwards a thin
tenor voice made itself heard above a vigorous splashing. The young
gentleman on the top floor was starting another day.

"Oi'll--er--sing thee saw-ongs"--brief pause, then in a triumphant
burst, as if the singer had just remembered the name--"ovarraby."

Mr. Garnet breathed a prayer and glared at the ceiling.

The voice continued:

"Ahnd--er--ta-ales of fa-arr Ca