ed every inch of it himself, including the
mysterious-looking Arabian gentleman in brilliantly hued wood, who sits
cross-legged luring you into the little place of magic. The wrought iron
brackets on the wall are patches of vivid tints; the curtains at the
windows are colour-dissonances, fascinating and bizarre. As usual there
is candlelight. And, as usual, there is the same delicious spirit of
seriously and whole-heartedly playing the game. While you are there you
are in the East. If it isn't the East to you, you can go away--back to
Philistia.

And speaking of candlelight. I went into the poets' favourite "Will o'
the Wisp" tea shop once and found the gas-jet lighted! The young girl
in charge jumped up, much embarrassed, and turned it out.

"I'm so sorry!" she apologised. "But I wanted to _see_ just a moment,
and lighted it!"

I peered at her face in the ghostly candlelight. It was entirely and
unmistakably earnest.

Just the same, Mrs. Browning's warning that "colours seen by
candlelight do not look the same by day" is not truly applicable to
these Village shrines. Even under the searching beams of a slanting,
summer afternoon sun, they are adorable. Go and see if you don't
believe this.

Then take the "Mad Hatter's." The entrance alone is a monument to the
make-believe capabilities of the Village. Scrawled on the stone wall
beside the steps that lead down to the little basement tea room, is an
inscription in chalk. It looks like anything but English. But if you
held a looking-glass up to it you would find that it is "Down the
Rabbit Hole" written backward! Now, if you know your "Alice" as well
as you should, you will recall delightedly her dash after the White
Rabbit which brought her to Wonderland, and, incidentally, to the Mad
Tea Party.

You go in to the little room where Villagers are drinking tea, and the
proprietress approaches to take your order. She is a good-looking
young woman dressed in a bizarre red and blue effect, not unlike one
of the Queens, but she prefers to be known as the "Dormouse"--not,
however, that she shows the slightest tendency to fall asleep.

On the wall is scribbled, "'There's plenty of room,' said Alice."

The people around you seem only pleasantly mad, not dangerously so.
There is a girl with an enchanting scrap of a monkey; there is a youth
with a manuscript and a pile of cigarette butts. The great thing here
once more is that they are taking their little play and their lit