and then at the eager little face below him.
"Heavy cold, Sir," he said stolidly. "Always makes 'em a bit hard o'
hearing. Poor old Topsy! Want to be left alone, do you?"

"What a pity," said Nancy. "Mother _will_ be sorry to hear that the
only one you could speak to was so ill and deaf."

"What were you giving him?" she asked as we walked away.

"Only a little New Year present for his children," I said.

"How do you know he's got any children?" Nancy demanded. "He didn't
say so, did he?"

"No, but I'm quite certain he has," I answered.

* * * * *

Letter received by an officer in Egypt:--

"Sir I have the honour and the opportunity to write you a letter
and I am coming to ask you and to pray you perhapse perchance it
is possible to found for me employment for translator. I am verry
sorry and mutch vex grieve bother pester haras teass consequently
accordingly consequtivey I made you acknowledg may petion request
and to bid you peradvanture well you occpied me for 6 months with
a contract. I beg you verry mutch to anwer respond reply if that
letter I supose deeme concieve cogitate mediat when you will
received my letter you will respond me at once imadiatty from
your cervill and faitfull."

It is inferred that the would-be "translator" kept a dictionary at his
elbow and took no chances.

* * * * *

[Illustration: _Visitor_. "YOU FOUGHT WITH THE GALLANT 51ST DIVISION,
DID YOU NOT?"

_Scot_. "AY--D'YE MIND MY FACE?"

_Visitor_. "OH--NOT AT ALL."]

* * * * *

OUR BOOKING-OFFICE.

(_BY MR. PUNCH'S STAFF OF LEARNED CLERKS._)

I wonder if I am alone in a feeling of impatience and bewilderment
over what I may call half-fairy stories. Magic I understand and love;
but this now diluted form of it leaves me cold. Take for example the
book that has occasioned this complaint, _The Curious Friends_ (ALLEN
AND UNWIN), an unconventional and perhaps just a little silly tale
about a secret association of children and grownups, pledged to mutual
help and a variety of altruistic aims--a scheme, with all its faults,
at least human and understandable. But Miss C.J. DELAGREVE has chosen
to complicate it by (apparently) a dash of the supernatural, in the
person of a character called _Saint Ken_, about whom we are told
that he lived in a tunnel on the Underground and employed himself in
help