my dear mother can still
read the smallest print without glasses."

We murmured our approval.

"And more," the Archdeacon went on, "she can thread her own needle."

We approved again.

"That's all very well," said the other, "but sight is not everything. Can
your mother hear?"

"She can hear all that I say to her," replied the Archdeacon.

"Ah! but you probably raise your voice, and she is accustomed to it. Could
she hear a stranger? Could she hear me?"

Remembering the tone of some of his after-lunch conversations I suggested
that perhaps it would be well if on occasions she could not. He glowered
down such frivolousness and proceeded with his cross-examination. "Are you
trying to assure us that your mother is not in the least bit deaf?"

"Well," the Archdeacon conceded, "I could not go so far as to say that her
hearing is still perfect."

The layman smiled his satisfaction. "In other words," he said, "she uses a
trumpet?"

The Archdeacon was silent.

"She uses a trumpet, Sir? Admit it."

"Now and then," said the Archdeacon, "my dear mother has recourse to that
aid."

"I knew it!" exclaimed the other. "My mother can hear every word. She goes
to the theatre too. Now your mother would have to go to the cinema if she
wished to be entertained."

"My mother," said the Archdeacon, "would not be interested in the cinema"
(he pronounced it ki-neema); "her mind is of a more serious turn."

"My mother is young enough to be interested in anything," said the other.
"And there is not one of her thirty-eight grandchildren of whose progress
she is not kept closely informed."

He leaned back with a gesture of triumph.

"How many grandchildren did you say?" the Archdeacon inquired. "I didn't
quite catch."

"Thirty-eight," the other man replied.

Across the cleric's ascetic features a happy smile slowly and conqueringly
spread. "My mother," he said, "has fifty-two grandchildren. And now," he
turned to me, "which of us would you say has won this entertaining
contest?"

"I should not like to decide," I said. "I am--fortunately perhaps for your
mothers--no Solomon. My verdict is that both of you are wonderfully lucky
men."

E.V.L.

* * * * *

[Illustration: _Valetudinarian._ "I'VE GOT CIRRHOSIS OF THE LIVER, AN
INCIPIENT CARBUNCLE ON MY NECK, INFLAMMATION OF THE DUODENUM, SEPTIC SORE
THROAT AND GENERAL PROSTRATION."

_Sympathetic Friend._ "WELL, AND HOW ARE YOU?"]

*