ow grieved I am to hear that you
cannot entertain the scheme.

Of course I can read between the lines, and know that your heart is in
it, and that it is only the many calls on your time which prevent your
active co-operation with me in the matter. Of course, needless to say,
your lack of support has killed what looked like being a promising
scientific bantling (through stress of emotion I nearly wrote
"bantam," which brings me to the subject of poultry. How are yours? I
forgot to ask before).

I hope the question of the S.L. & S.S. will now be dropped; it is too
painful. If you insist on continuing the discussion I shall decline to
answer the letter, so there!

Yours,
H.

But Petherton refused to be drawn.

* * * * *

From a Church appeal:--

"A recent collection revealed that, of 179 coins put in the plate,
176 were coppers, whilst not more than 15 people could have
contributed anything above one shilling."

The person who took the twelve silver coins by mistake will, we hope,
return them next Sunday.

* * * * *

=THE SHERWOOD FORESTERS.=

Deep in the greenwood year by year
Bold ROBIN HOOD, a knightly ghost,
Has eased the purse that bulged the most
And stalked the wraiths of Rufford deer;

And, as the centuries speed away,
Has seen his oak and birk-land shrink,
Where teeming cities on its brink
Crowd in on Sherwood of to-day.

But still each year the outlaw-king,
By Normanton and Perlethorpe spire,
Has watched the beeches' emerald fire
Flare upward in the leaping spring;

Each heather-time has found his own
Eyrie of rest where Higger Tor
Shimmers in purple as before
KING COEUR-DE-LION held his throne.

And Foresters away "out there,"
Sons of his sons, have surely seen
A figure clad in Lincoln green
Glide by them swiftly, thin as air;

And, yarning in the creepy dark,
Have told of arrows, cloth-yard long,
Whistling before them clean and strong,
Of Huns that got them, pierced and stark;

How when their line is making good,
In charge or trench, as Sherwoods can,
Soft-footed, ever in the van,
Stalks the bold ghost of ROBIN HOOD.

* * * * *

[Illustration: _Mrs. Jones_ (_suspiciously, to Jones, who is kept on
strict rations_). "SOMEBODY HAS EATEN FIDO'S DINNER."]

* * *