W. V.«.

and most reprehensible in elderly people
(I elderly!) to encourage them.

We are glad to escape to the armchair,
where, after I have lit my pipe and W. V.
has blown the elf of flame back to fairyland,
we conspire —not overtly indeed, but each
in his deep mind — how we shall baffle do-
mestic tyranny and evade, if but for a few
brief minutes of recorded time, the cubicular
moment and the inevitable hand of the bath-
maiden.

The critical instant occurs about half-way
through my first pipe, and W. V.’s devices
for respite or escape are at once innumerable
and transparently ingenious. I admit my
connivance without a blush, though I may
perchance weakly observe: ‘‘One sees so
little of her, mother ;’’ for how delightful it
is when she sings or recites—and no one
would be so rude as to interrupt a song or
recitation — to watch the little hands waving
in “the air so blue,” the little fingers flick-
ering above her head in imitation of the
sparks at the forge, the little arms nursing
an imaginary weeping dolly, the blue eyes lit
up with excitement as they gaze abroad from

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