_Question._ I understand that you are leaving Town. Why?

_Answer._ Because it is the fashion.

_Q._ Have you any plans?

_A._ I am a little undecided. At first I thought of going to an English
watering-place, but abandoned the idea because the papers said I should be
sure to be laid up with typhoid fever, German measles, or something equally
pleasant.

_Q._ Had it not been for this dread, should you have gone?

_A._ I suppose so. We are acclimatised to the discomforts of seaside
lodgings, the discords of second-rate German bands, and the disillusions of
country views.

_Q._ For the sake of argument, abandoning the English watering-place--where
shall you go?

_A._ My wife says Paris--and means it.

_Q._ Do you object yourself to the gay capital?

_A._ Well--just now--yes; chiefly because it is not gay.

_Q._ I suppose you would prefer the principal theatres to be open?

_A._ If I could attend them without being sure that I should find the "hot
room" of a Turkish bath considerably cooler. Not that there would not be a
risk of being grilled to death on the Boulevards and bored out of my life
by running across hundreds of personally-conducted tourists.

_Q._ Then why should you go?

_A._ Because my wife wishes to see the bonnets.

_Q._ Could she see them nowhere else?

_A._ Not to her satisfaction, although I believe she could find their
counterparts in Tottenham Court Road and the Westbourne Grove.

_Q._ After Paris where shall you go?

_A._ Either to Switzerland, Italy, or Holland.

_Q._ Do you expect much amusement?

_A._ Not much, because I know them by heart. Still I know the best hotels,
or rather the best _table d'hotes_.

_Q._ Is that all you care for?

_A._ Nearly all. However it is a languid satisfaction to compare St.
Peter's with St. Paul's to the disadvantage of the former, and to think
there is nothing in Switzerland to equal the Trossachs, Loch Maree and the
Cumberland Lakes.

_Q._ But the Art treasures?

_A._ May be found _en bloc_ at the South Kensington Museum.

_Q._ Then you travel in rather a gloomy mood.

_A._ Rather. Still I am buoyed up with a delightful prospect in the future.

_Q._ A delightful prospect! What prospect?

_A._ The prospect of returning home!

* * * * *

SCARCELY "BUTTER."--To change the nickname of MADGE to Margarine.

* * * * *

LADIES' LAW.

[Illustration]

Some little while