sian imperial family; as a matter of fact, she knew a newspaper
correspondent, a young man who ate _bortsch_ with the air of having
invented it. Sledonti's "Poems of Death and Passion" were now being sold
by the thousand in seven European languages, and were about to be
translated into Syrian, a circumstance which made the discerning critics
of the Nuremberg rather shy of maturing their future judgments too
rapidly and too irrevocably.

As regards Knopfschrank's work, they did not lack opportunity for
inspecting and appraising it. However resolutely he might hold himself
aloof from the social life of his restaurant acquaintances, he was not
minded to hide his artistic performances from their inquiring gaze. Every
evening, or nearly every evening, at about seven o'clock, he would make
his appearance, sit himself down at his accustomed table, throw a bulky
black portfolio on to the chair opposite him, nod round indiscriminately
at his fellow-guests, and commence the serious business of eating and
drinking. When the coffee stage was reached he would light a cigarette,
draw the portfolio over to him, and begin to rummage among its contents.
With slow deliberation he would select a few of his more recent studies
and sketches, and silently pass them round from table to table, paying
especial attention to any new diners who might be present. On the back
of each sketch was marked in plain figures the announcement "Price ten
shillings."

If his work was not obviously stamped with the hall-mark of genius, at
any rate it was remarkable for its choice of an unusual and unvarying
theme. His pictures always represented some well-known street or public
place in London, fallen into decay and denuded of its human population,
in the place of which there roamed a wild fauna, which, from its wealth
of exotic species, must have originally escaped from Zoological Gardens
and travelling beast shows. "Giraffes drinking at the fountain pools,
Trafalgar Square," was one of the most notable and characteristic of his
studies, while even more sensational was the gruesome picture of
"Vultures attacking dying camel in Upper Berkeley Street." There were
also photographs of the large canvas on which he had been engaged for
some months, and which he was now endeavouring to sell to some
enterprising dealer or adventurous amateur. The subject was "Hyaenas
asleep in Euston Station," a composition that left nothing to be desired
in the way of sugg