_The Expert._ "Any nature sketch ends satisfactorily with a meal."]
All this time the crescent moon has been swelling silently under the watchful stars. It is now at the full. So is Red Head. He has dined five times. He sleeps.
[Illustration: (_Lady Bountiful is entertaining some slum children at her lovely place in the country._)
_Sister (to small brother who has just picked a daisy)._ "NAR VEN, 'ERB! THE LIDY WON'T ARST YER AGINE IF YER GOW A-PICKIN' 'ER FLOWERS LIKE THET!"]
Dame Fashion, when she calls the tune, Must surely crave my pardon For prisoning me in leafy June Far from my Alpine garden.
So that in crowded square or street My Fancy's playful mockery Plants all the pavement at my feet With favourites from the rockery.
And so that, heedless to the claims Of passing conversation, I murmur to myself their names By way of consolation.
The thread of compliment may run Through many ball-room Babels-- I have one language, only one, The language of the labels.
In Kedar's tents are festive hours, The _noctes_ and the _coenæ_; My heart is where _RETUSA_ flowers, And crimson-starred _SILENE_.
I see the grey stones overhung With lilac and laburnum; I hear the drone of bees among Blue depths of _LITHOSPERNUM_.
And in the box on opera nights Between each thrilling scene I Recall the miniature delights Of _MENTHA REQUIENII_;
Admirers find me deaf and dumb To all their honeyed wheedling, I muse on _LONGIFOLIUM_ And dream of _STORMONTH SEEDLINGS_.
And, when they come to hint their loves Through all the usual stages, I wish I were in gardening gloves Among my Saxifrages.
_The Daily News_, in describing an adventure between the CROWN PRINCE of Germany (in a motor) and a peasant of Saarbrücken, ventures (with a knowledge of the Saarbrücken dialect which we ourselves cannot claim) to give the peasant's actual words:--
"'Ain't 'eard nowt,' said the peasant; 'the lane be narrow like. You must just wait till I be druv ahead.'"
Its likeness to the Loamshire dialect of England will interest the philologist.
We plunged into the action quickly enough. A breakfast-gong--a sip of coffee--a bite of toast--and _Nigel Parry_ locks up his morning's love-correspondence; _Helen_, his wife, breaks open the drawer and peruses the damning letter; _Nigel_ returns and catches her red-handed. After this we took a long breath and lingered over the moral aspect of the situation. Indeed, during the next ten years nothing occurred except the separation of the couple; the reported decease of the other woman (whom we never saw, dead or alive), and the marriage of the boy _Parry_ with an actress bearing the ascetic name of _Ursula_. We now left the old trail in pursuit of this red herring; and for the rest of the play, up to the last moment, our attention was concentrated on the attitude of the elder heroine to her daughter-in-law, to whom she had taken a profound dislike at sight.