nue my advertisement of a half-pair of bellows and a
stuffed canary, as the first insertion has had such remarkable results. On
looking out of my bedroom window this morning I observed a queue of some
hundreds of people extending from my doorstep down to the trams in the main
road. They included ladies on campstools, messenger boys, a sad-looking
young man in an ulster who was reading SWINBURNE'S poems, and others. Only
with difficulty could the milkman fight his way through to place the can on
the doorstep, and the contents were quickly required to restore a lady who
had turned faint for want of a camp-stool. While I was shaving, a motor
mail-van dashed up and left seven sacks of postal replies to the
advertisement. One by one, eighty-three people were admitted to view the
goods, and a satisfactory bargain was made with the last of these. I then
telephoned for the police to come and remove the disappointed thousands,
who were disposed to be riotous. My garden gate is off its hinges, the
garden itself has the lawn inextricably mixed with the flower-beds, my
marble step is cracked in three places, and my stair-carpet is caked with
mud. I do not know any other paper in this country in which a two-shilling
advertisement could produce such encouraging results."

* * * * *

ORANGES AND LEMONS.

I.--THE INVITATION.

"DEAR MYRA," wrote Simpson at the beginning of the year,--"I have an
important suggestion to make to you both, and I am coming round
to-morrow night after dinner about nine o'clock. As time is so short I
have asked Dahlia and Archie to meet me there, and if by any chance
you have gone out we shall wait till you come back.

Yours ever,
SAMUEL.

P.S.--I have asked Thomas too."

"Well?" said Myra eagerly, as I gave her back the letter.

In deep thought I buttered a piece of toast.

"We could stop Thomas," I said. "We might ring up the Admiralty and ask
them to give him something to do this evening. I don't know about Archie.
Is he----"

"Oh, what do you think it is? Aren't you excited?" She sighed and added,
"Of course I know what Samuel _is_."

"Yes. Probably he wants us all to go to the Wonder Zoo together ... or he's
discovered a new way of putting, or---- I say, I didn't know Archie and
Dahlia were in town."

"They aren't. But I expect Samuel telegraphed to them to meet him under the
clock at Charing Cross, disguised, when they