(She bobs.)

Good evening, m'm.

  MRS. HAVERTON (by way of reply):
Now, then! What's all this fuss about the washing?

  MISS COBLEY: Please, m'm, the seven collars, what you sent—
I mean the seven what was marked—was wrong,
And mother says as you'd have had the washing
Only there weren't but five, and would you mind….

  MRS. HAVERTON (sharply): I cannot understand a word you say.
Go back and tell your mother there were seven.
And if she sends home five she pays for two.
So there! (Snorts.)

MISS COBLEY (sobbing): I'm sure I….

  MRS. HAVERTON (savagely): Don't stand snuffling there!
Go back and tell your mother what I say….
Impudent hussy!…

(Exit MISS COBLEY sobbing. A pause.)

  REV. A. HAVERTON (with assumed authority): To return to Helen.
Tell me concisely and without complaints,
Why did she give you notice?

(A hand-bell rings in the passage.)

FIDO: Bow-wow-wow!

REV. A. HAVERTON (giving him a smart kick): Shurrup!

  FIDO (howling). Pen-an'-ink! Pen-an'-ink
                            Pen-an'-ink! Pen-an'-ink!

  REV. A. HAVERTON (controlling himself, as well as he can, goes to
    the door and calls into the passage): Miss Grosvenor!
(Louder) … Miss Grosvenor!… Was that the bell for prayers?
Was that the bell for prayers?… (Louder) Miss Grosvenor.
(Louder) Miss Gros-ve-nor! (Tapping with his foot.)
    Oh!…

MISS GROSVENOR (sweetly and, far off): Is that Mr. Haverton?

  REV. A. HAVERTON: Yes! yes! yes! yes!…
Was that the bell for prayers?

  MISS GROSVENOR (again): Yes? Is that Mr. Haverton? Oh! Yes!
I think it is…. I'll see—I'll ask Matilda.

      (A pause, during which the REV. A. HAVERTON
        is in a qualm.)

  MISS GROSVENOR (rustling back): Matilda says it
    is the bell for prayers.

      (They all come filing into the study and arranging the chairs.
        As they enter MISS HARVEY, the guest, treads heavily on
        MATILDA'S foot.)

MISS HARVEY: Matilda? Was that you? I beg your pardon.

MATILDA (limping): Granted, I'm sure, miss!

  MRS. HAVERTON (whispering to the REV. A. HAVERTON): Do not read
    the Creed!
Miss Harvey is a Unitarian.
I should suggest some simple form of prayer,
Some heartfelt word of charity and peace
Common to every Christian.

REV. A. HAVERTON (in a deep voice): Let us pray.

Curtain.

ON A NOTEBOOK

A dear friend of mine (John Abdullah Capricorn, to give him his full name) was commandeered by a publisher last year to write a book for £10. The work was far advanced when an editor offered him £15 and his expenses to visit the more desperate parts of the Sahara Desert, to which spots he at once proceeded upon a roving commission. Whether he will return or no is now doubtful, though in March we had the best hopes. With the month of May life becomes hard for Europeans south of the Atlas, and when my poor dear friend was last heard of he was chancing his popularity with a tribe of Touaregs about two hundred miles south of Touggourt.

Under these circumstances I was asked to look through his notebook and see what could be done; and I confess to a pleased surprise…. It would have been a very entertaining book had it been published. It will be a very entertaining book if it is published.

Capricorn seems to have prepared a hotchpotch of information of human follies, of contrasts, and of blunt stupidities of which he intended to make a very entertaining series of pages. I have not his talent for bringing such things together, but it may amuse the reader if I merely put in their order one or two of the notes which most struck me.

I find first, cut out of a newspaper and pasted into the book (many of his notes are in this form), the following really jovial paragraph:

"Archdeacon Blunderbuss (Blunderbuss is not the real name; I suppress that lest Capricorn's widow should lose her two or three pounds, in case the poor fellow has really been eaten). Archdeacon Blunderbuss was more distinguished as a scholar than as a Divine.