s not allowed. In the glorious East he
might have married again and again and we could have made it all right
about the wedding present.

"I wish he was a Turk for some things," said Oswald, and explained why.

"I don't think _she_ would like it," said Dora.

Oswald explained that if he was a Turk, she would be a Turquoise (I
think that is the feminine Turk), and so would be used to lots of wives
and be lonely without them.

And just then . . . You know what they say about talking of angels, and
hearing their wings? (There is another way of saying this, but it is not
polite, as the present author knows.)

Well, just then the postman came, and of course we rushed out, and among
Father's dull letters we found one addressed to "The Bastables Junior."
It had an Italian stamp--not at all a rare one, and it was a poor
specimen too, and the post-mark was _Roma_.

That is what the Italians have got into the habit of calling Rome. I
have been told that they put the "a" instead of the "e" because they
like to open their mouths as much as possible in that sunny and
agreeable climate.

The letter was jolly--it was just like hearing him talk (I mean reading,
not hearing, of course, but reading him talk is not grammar, and if you
can't be both sensible and grammarical, it is better to be senseless).

"Well, kiddies," it began, and it went on to tell us about things he had
seen, not dull pictures and beastly old buildings, but amusing incidents
of comic nature. The Italians must be extreme Jugginses for the kind of
things he described to be of such everyday occurring. Indeed, Oswald
could hardly believe about the soda-water label that the Italian
translated for the English traveller so that it said, "To distrust of
the Mineral Waters too fountain-like foaming. They spread the shape."

Near the end of the letter came this:--

"You remember the chapter of 'The Golden Gondola' that I wrote for the
_People's Pageant_ just before I had the honour to lead to the altar,
&c. I mean the one that ends in the subterranean passage, with
Geraldine's hair down, and her last hope gone, and the three villains
stealing upon her with Venetian subtlety in their hearts and Toledo
daggers (specially imported) in their garters? I didn't care much for it
myself, you remember. I think I must have been thinking of other things
when I wrote it. But you, I recollect, consoled me by refusing to regard
it as other than 'ripping.' 'Clinking' was, as I r