badly. I tried not to look pleased.

We found his ball in a thick clump of heather. With a grim look on his face, he took out his niblick....

I stayed by him and helped him count up to eight.

"Where's your ball?" he growled.

"A long way on," I said reproachfully. "I wish you'd hurry up. The poor thing will be getting cold."

He got to work again. We had another count together up to fifteen. Sometimes there would be a gleam of white at the top of the heather for a moment and then it would fade away.

"How many?" I asked some minutes later.

"About thirty. But I don't care, I'm going to get the little beast into the hole if it takes me all night." He went on hacking.

I had lost interest in the performance, for the Cup was mine, but I did admire his Colonial grit.

"Got it," he cried suddenly, and the ball sailed out on to the pretty. Another shot put him level with me.

"Thirty-two?" I asked.

"About," he said coldly.

I began to look for my ball. It had got tired of waiting and had hidden itself. Smith joined gloomily in the search.

"This is absurd," I said after three or four minutes.

"By Jove!" said Smith, suddenly brightening up. "If your ball's lost I win after all."

"Nonsense; you've given the hole up," I protested. "You don't know how many you've played. According to the rules if I ask you how many, and you give wrong information——"

"It's thirty-five," he said promptly.

"I don't believe you counted."

"Call it forty-five then. There's nothing to prevent my calling it more than it really is. If it was really only forty, then I'm counting five occasions when the ball rolled over as I was addressing it. That's very generous of me. Actually I'm doubtful if the ball did roll over five times, but I say it did in order to be on the safe side." He looked at his watch. "And if you don't find your ball in thirty seconds you lose the hole."

It was ingenious, but the Mother Country can be ingenious too.

"How many have you played exactly?" I asked. "Be careful."

"Forty-five," he said. "Exactly."

"Right." I took my niblick and swung at the heather. "Bother," I said. "Missed it. Two."

"Hallo! Have you found it?"

"I have. It's somewhere in this field. There's no rule which insists that you shall hit the ball, or even that you shall hit near the ball, or even that you shall see the ball when you hit at it. Lots of old gentlemen shut their eyes and miss the sphere. I've missed. In five minutes I shall miss again."

"But what's the point?"

"The point, dear friend," I smiled, "is that after each stroke one is allowed five minutes in which to find the ball. I have forty-three strokes in hand; that gives me three hours and thirty-five minutes in which to look for it. At regular intervals of five minutes I shall swing my club and probably miss. It's four-thirty now; at eight o'clock, unless I find my ball before, I shall be playing the like. And if you are a sportsman," I added, "you will bring me out some tea in half-an-hour."

At six-thirty I was still looking—and swinging. Smith then came to terms and agreed to share the cup with me for the first year. He goes back to Canada to-morrow, and will spread the good news there that the Old Country can still hold its own in resource, determination and staying power. But next year we are going to play friendly golf again.

A. A. M.

"I say, Nora, that woman's wearing rather a smart coat."

THE EAVESDROPPER.

It may not be generally known that, on very still nights, in the small hours, when there are no taxis rushing past and no late revellers returning home, it is possible, by leaning against a pillar-box and placing one's ear close to the opening, to hear the letters converse. Provided, of course, that one has a pure soul, as I have. Otherwise there is no sound.

Chancing to be out late the other night in a very quiet neighbourhood, I suddenly noticed a pillar-box and was reminded that I had a letter to post. I dropped it in and held my breath as I listened.

"Here's another!" said a voice. "Who are you, pray?"

"I'm an acceptance with thanks," said my letter.

"What do you accept?" another voice asked.

"An invitation to dinner," said my letter, with a touch of swank.

"Pooh!" said the other. "Only that."

"It's at a house in Kensington," said my letter rather haughtily.

"Well, I'm an acceptance of an invitation to a dance at a duchess's," was the reply, and my poor letter said no more.

Then all the others began to chatter,

"I contain news of a death," said one.

"I bring news of a legacy," said another.

"I demand the payment of a debt," said a sharp metallic voice.

"I decline an offer of marriage," said a fourth, rather wistfully.

"I've got a cheque inside," said a fifth with a swagger.

"I convey the sack," said a sixth in triumph.

"What do you think I am?" another inquired. "You shall have six guesses."

"Give us a clue," said a voice.

"Very well. I'm a foolscap envelope."

Then the guessing began.

One said a writ.

Another said an income-tax demand.

But no one could guess it.

"I'm a poem for a paper," said the foolscap letter at last.

"Are you good?" asked a voice.

"Not good enough, I'm afraid," said the poem. "In fact I've been out and back again seven times already."

"Guess what I am," said a sentimental murmur.

"Any one could guess that," was the gruff reply. "You're a love-letter."

"Quite right," said the sentimental murmur. "But how clever of you!"

"Well," said another, "you're not the only love-letter here. I'm a love-letter too."

"How do you begin?" asked the first.

"I begin, 'My Darling,'" said the second love-letter.

"That's nothing," said the first; "I begin, 'My Ownest Own.'"

"I don't think much of either of those beginnings," said a new voice. "I begin, 'Most Beautiful.'"

"You're from a man, I suppose?" said the second love-letter.

"Yes, I am," said the new one. "Aren't you?"

"No, I'm from a woman," said the second. "I'll admit your beginning's rather good. But how do you end?"

"I end with 'A million kisses,'" said the new one.

"Ah, I've got you there!" said the second. "I end with 'For ever and ever yours.'"

"That's not bad," said the second, "but my ending is pretty good in its way. I end like this, 'To-morrow will be Heaven once more, for then we meet again.'"

"Oh, do stop all this love talk!" said the gruff letter, when I was conscious of a hand on my arm and a lantern in my face.

"Here," said the authoritative tones of the law, "I think you've been leaning against this pillar-box long enough. If you can't walk I'll help you home."

Thus does metallic prose invade the delicate realms of supernature.

"Captain Amilcar Magalhaes, chief of the Brazilian Mission, accompanying Mr. Roosevelt, says the ex-President has discovered a tribe of savages named Panhates. The total bag collected on the expedition amounts to about 2,000 specimens.—Reuter."

Sussex Daily News.

The flower of the tribe, no doubt.

Promising Member of Junior Form (having been given a lesson on Samson and told to