very morning I say it--'I'm doubting whether I did ought
to call that 'ere bird a 'Artz Mountain roller,' I say to 'er--me
meaning, o' course, as the 'Artz Mountains being, as some thinks, in
Germany, that pussons wouldn't so much as go to look at a canary as
called 'isself a 'Artz Mountain bird, as it might be a German bird,
for all as 'e'd never a-bin no nearer Germany than the Royal Road,
Chelsea, not never since 'e chip 'is little shell, 'e 'aven't.

"So I ask 'er the question, doubting like, and she up and say, all
saucy as a jay-bird, 'Why, certainly you didn't ought to call 'im so,'
she say.

"'Question is, Maria,' I says, 'in that case what did I ought to call
'im?'

"'And I can tell yer that too, Dad,' she say--Maria did. 'You didn't
ought to call 'im 'Artz Mountain roller, but ha-Hartz Mountain roller.
That's the way to call 'im,' she says--impident little 'ussy! But
there--what's in a name, as the white blackbird said when 'e sat on a
wooden milestone eating a red blackberry? Still, 'e weren't running
a live-stock emporium, I expect, when 'e ask such a question as that
'ere. There's a good deal in 'ow you call a bird, or a dawg or a
guinea-pig neither, if you want to pass 'im on to a customer in a
honest way o' trade."

I assured Mr. Punt I had not a doubt of it.

"But I shall be a-practisin' my haitches, Sir," he promised
me, as I went out with the canary seed which I had called to
purchase--"practise 'em 'ard, I shall. It's what I ain't a-got at the
present moment--'a fine ear for the haspirate.' Beeutiful expression
that, Sir, if you'll excuse me sayin' so. But I don't see no reason
as a man mightn't 'ope to acquire it, 'im practising constant and
careful--same as a pusson can learn a bullfinch to pipe ''Ome, sweet
'Ome.' That haitch is a funny letter, but it's a letter as I shall
practise. Still, haitches or no haitches," he concluded, with a
profound sigh, "I wish as I knowed 'ow I could set about coming it
over that 'ere one-legged widder lidy at Putney what 'ave the two
great hauk's eggs."

Out of the dusty twilight in the far end of the shop Mrs. Punt's eye
gleamed balefully.

* * * * *

BLIGHTY IMPRESSIONS.

THE BARBER.

I went into a tobacco-shop, tendered a pound note and asked for a
packet of cigarettes and a box of matches. With much regret and a
smiling face, she informed me she had the goods but no change.

What a dilemma! A shop with cigarettes an