. When I do, I will perhaps let you have some tales "hot from the oven."
In the meantime I find the Travel section of our local library a more
comfortable and probably a more accurate source of copy. But I still have
to draw on my imagination to some extent. The Mendes may be pure Yanks for
all I know to the contrary; but I hope for their own sakes they aren't
Zishtis. It sounds such a horrible thing to be.

As for the "leopard" murders, I got my information from Major Kingsley,
D.S.O., who has been a Government officer in Nigeria and Sierra Leone for
fourteen years, so there may be something in it. As he is a close friend of
mine I sent my story to him out there for him to look through before
letting you have it, and he very kindly posted it direct to you. He has
written to tell me that the ignorance shown in it was such as to preclude
any possibility of improvement by revision.

By the way, Major Kingsley was the author of _Red Shadows_. He asked me as
a special favour to godfather it, as he believed an unknown writer stood no
chance. It is a perfectly true story. My kindest regards to your expert.

Yours very truly,
AUBREY ASTON.

* * * * *

[Illustration: FLOWERS OF SPEECH (U.S.A.).

_Wealthy American Westerner_ (_anxious to show his great appreciation of
the able and enthusiastic way in which the duchess has pleaded the cause of
her pet charity_). "WAAL, GOOD-BYE, DUCHESS. I WILL SEND YOU A CHEQUE,
SURE. I GUESS SOME OF THESE CHARITIES WOULDN'T BE SO SICK IF THEY HAD CRAZY
BOOMERS LIKE YOU TO BOOST 'EM ALONG."]

* * * * *

"Many correspondents have asked whether Mrs. Cornwallis received this
compensation because her husband was a reader of this
journal."--_Daily Mail._

Could they have meant--correspondents being notoriously rude--that the
husband deserved it more?

* * * * *

A CHARM

(_whereby a modern male adult mortal may be pleasantly initiated into the
fairy state_).

O male adult, O male adult!
This is the way we make a fairy:--
_Quicunque vult
Silvis terrisque imperare_,
Think upon oaks and thorns and ashes,
On glow-worms and on fire-fly flashes,
On rooty loams and stony brashes!
Then upon thyme and tansy think,
On fields of sainfoin, ruddy pink,
On dells deep down and rocks upreared,
On lad's-love and on old-man's-beard,
On spearmint and on