t to his taste--the treatment of life in the street and the open
country, in the shops and parlours of the lower middle class, and the
homes of the people.

And to me were allotted the social and domestic dramas, the nursery,
the school-room, the dining and drawing rooms, and croquet-lawns of
the more or less well-to-do.

I was particularly told not to try to be broadly funny, but to
undertake the light and graceful business, like a _jeune premier_. I
was, in short, to be the tenor, or rather the tenorino, of that little
company for which Mr. Punch beats time with his immortal baton, and to
warble in black and white such melodies as I could evolve from my
contemplations of the gentler aspect of English life, while Keene,
with his magnificent, highly trained basso, sang the comic songs.

We all became specialised, so to speak, and divided Leech's vast
domain among us.

We kicked a little at first, I remember, and whenever (to continue the
musical simile) I could get in a comic song, or what I thought one, or
some queer fantastic ditty about impossible birds and beasts and
fishes and what not, I did not let the opportunity slip; while Keene,
who had a very fine falsetto on the top of his chest register, would
now and then warble, pianissimo, some little ballad of the
drawing-room or nursery.

Illustration: FELINE AMENITIES

But gradually we settled into our respective grooves, and I have grown
to like my little groove very much, narrow though it be--a poor thing,
but mine own!

"I_wish_ you hadn't asked Captain Wareham, Lizzie. Horrid man! I can't
bear him!"

"Dear me, Charlotte--isn't the world big enough for you both?"

"Yes; but your little Dining-room _isn't_!"--_Punch_, February 16,
1889.]

Moreover, certain physical disabilities that I have the misfortune to
labour under make it difficult for me to study and sketch the lusty
things in the open air and sunshine. My sight, besides being defective
in many ways, is so sensitive that I cannot face the common light of
day without glasses thickly rimmed with wire gauze, so that sketching
out of doors is often to me a difficult and distressing performance.
That is also partly why I am not a sportsman and a delineator of
sport.

I mention this infirmity not as an excuse for my shortcomings and
failures--for them there is no excuse--but as a reason why I have
abstained from the treatment of so much that is so popular,
delightful, and exhilarating in English co