Chamberlain, the late Dr. Bull, or whoever is most concerned, will sympathise with me when I say that this time I remained seated. I have my living to earn.

From that day Johnny has interpreted Dr. John Bull's favourite composition nine times every morning. As this has been going on for three months, and as the line I mentioned has two special rehearsals to itself before coming out right, you can easily work out how many send-him-victoriouses Johnny and I have collaborated in. About two thousand.

Very well. Now, you ask yourself, why did I not send a polite note to Johnny's father asking him to restrain his little boy from over-composition, begging him not to force the child's musical genius too quickly, imploring him (in short) to lock up the piano and lose the key? What kept me from this course? The answer is "Patriotism." Those deep feelings for his country which one man will express glibly by rising nine times during the morning at the sound of the National Anthem, another will direct to more solid uses. It was my duty, I felt, not to discourage Johnny. He was showing qualities which could not fail, when he grew up, to be of value to the nation. Loyalty, musical genius, determination, patience, industry—never before have these qualities been so finely united in a child of six. Was I to say a single word to disturb the delicate balance of such a boy's mind? At six one is extraordinarily susceptible to outside influence. A word from his father to the effect that the gentleman above was getting sick of it, and Johnny's whole life might be altered.

No, I would bear it grimly.

And then, yesterday, who should write to me but Johnny's father himself. This was the letter:—

"Dear Sir,—I do not wish to interfere unduly in the affairs of the other occupants of these flats, but I feel bound to call your attention to the fact that for many weeks now there has been a flow of water from your bathroom which has penetrated through the ceiling of my bathroom, particularly after you have been using the room in the mornings. May I therefore beg you to be more careful in future not to splash or spill water on your floor, seeing that it causes inconvenience to the tenants beneath you?

Yours faithfully, Jno. McAndrew."

You can understand how I felt about this. For months I had been suffering Johnny in silence; yet, at the first little drop of water, from above, Johnny's father must break out into violent abuse of me. A fine reward! Well, Johnny's future could look after itself now; anyhow, he was doomed with a selfish father like that.

"Dear Sir," I answered defiantly,—"Now that we are writing to each other I wish to call your attention to the fact that for many months past there has been a constant flow of one-fingered music from your little boy, which penetrates through the floor of my library and makes all work impossible. May I beg you therefore to see that your child is taught a new tune immediately, seeing that the National Anthem has lost its first freshness for the tenants above him?"

His reply to this came to-day.

"Dear Sir,—I have no child.

Yours faithfully, Jno. McAndrew."

I was so staggered that I could only think of one adequate retort.

"Dear Sir," I wrote,—"I never have a bath."

So that's the end of Johnny, my boy prodigy, for whom I have suffered so long. It is not Johnny but Jno. who struggles with the National Anthem. He will give up music now, for he knows I have the bulge on him; I can flood his bathroom whenever I like. Probably he will learn something quieter—like painting. Anyway, Dr. John Bull's masterpiece will rise no more through the ceiling of the flat below.

On referring to my encyclopædia, I see that, according to some authorities, "God Save the King" is "wrongly attributed" to Dr. Bull. Well, I wrongly attributed it to Johnny. It is easy to make these mistakes.

A. A. M.

WEST HIGHLAND.

HOW TO IMPROVE LONDON.

We were discussing London's needs. Each of us was suggesting some long-felt want which most appealed to him or her.

Some had declared that what London chiefly wanted was a tube from Victoria to Chelsea. Someone else said that what it chiefly wanted was a glass roof over Bond Street and the chief shopping area. Someone else said that what it chiefly wanted was perforated pavements to let the rain through at once—and so on.

"What I want," said a pretty girl—so pretty that I almost got up and set about providing her with it—"is a guide to the cinemas. I adore cinemas, but there is no means of knowing what is on unless you go to the place itself. Then very likely it's some stupid long play, with more printed descriptions than deeds and more letters to read than people to see. Now there ought to be a list of all the cinema programmes on sale at the bookstalls, like The Times and Spectator."

"Wouldn't you have a cinema critic too," someone asked, "like Mr. Walkley, to say how the films amused him, and so on?"

"No, I don't want that," she said. "But I should like information as to how long they were, and if they were American or Italian or French or English, and I should like a star to be put against those which Mr. Redford had not thought splendid."

When it came to my turn I said that London's most crying need was a tailors' clearing-house.

"What on earth is that?" they asked.

"Well," I said, "I'll tell you. All men have tailors, and for the most part they stick to them, because they find them all right, or fear to go further afield to begin all over again. But every now and then it happens, no matter how good the tailor, that a coat is stubborn. It goes on being wrong. Fitting after fitting leaves it even worse than before; and the result is that one either loses one's temper and bangs out of the place and never enters it again, or, not wishing to hurt the tailor's feelings, one accepts defeat and gives the coat away the next day at considerable personal loss. In other words, a time comes when one either cannot, through disgust, bring oneself to visit one's tailor again on that matter, or when one cannot, through sympathy, bring oneself to ask him to do any more. Don't you know that?"

They agreed.

"Very well then. This is where the clearing-house