well and loyally to resemble as closely as he can his royal master.

Having reached this point, I turned No. 344260 over and examined the
back, which represents the Houses of Parliament as seen from Lambeth.
There are three peculiarities about this picture. One is that all the
emphasis is laid--where of late we have not been in the habit of looking
for it--on the House of Lords; another is that Parliament is not
sitting, for the Victoria Tower is without its flag; and the third is
that Broad Sanctuary has been completely eliminated, so that the Abbey
and the Victoria Tower form one building. No doubt to the fortunate
persons through whose hands one pound notes pass, such awful symbolism
conveys a sense of England's greatness and power; but I think it would
be far more amusing if the back had been left blank, in case some later
Robbie Burns (could this decadent world ever know so fine a thing
again) wished to write another lament on it:

For lack o' thee I've lost my lass,
For lack o' thee I scrimp my glass.

Or, if not blank, thirty (say) spaces might be ruled on it, in which the
names of its first thirty owners could be written. By the time the
spaces were filled it would be a document historically valuable now and
then to autograph collectors. It would also be dirty enough to call in.

The Two Perkinses

Walking in the garden in the cool of the July evening, I was struck
afresh by the beauty of that climbing rose we call Dorothy Perkins, and
by her absolute inability to make a mistake. There are in this garden
several of these ramblers, all heritages from an earlier tenant and all
very skilfully placed: one over an arch, one around a window, and three
or four clambering up fir posts on which the stumps of boughs remain;
and in every case the rose is flowering more freely than ever before,
and has arranged its blossoms, leaves, and branches with an exquisite
and impeccable taste. Always lovely, Dorothy Perkins is never so lovely
as in the evening, just after the sun has gone, when the green takes on
a new sobriety against which her gay and tender pink is gayer and more
tender. "Pretty little Dolly Perkins!" I said to myself involuntarily,
and instantly, by the law of association--which, I sometimes fondly
suppose, is more powerful with me than with many people--I began to
think of another evening, twenty and more years ago, when for the first
time I heard the most dainty of English comic songs sung