pass-book lore, manage to postpone her financial catastrophe for two whole years?  And how do they suppose so popular and personable man as Taradine could come back to England under an assumed name without a number of highly inconvenient questions being asked?  More seriously, I would ask if they really expect us to believe in the reconciliation on so deep a note of this nice butterfly and this callous husband, who never intended, but for the War, to come back from his big-game shooting, and who took no pains to arrange suitable guidance (there was a lawyer vaguely mentioned but he seems to have been singularly unobtrusive) for the obviously incompetent spouse whom he professes still to love?  I am afraid it will not do.  The one real point of weakness in the presentation was that Mr. EADIE could not modulate from the key of agreeable flippancy in which the comedy as a whole was set into that of the solemnly sentimental coda.  Thus was the artistic unity of a pleasant trifle destroyed.

Mr. DAWSON MILWARD’S clever careful method made the Colonel a very live and plausible figure.  Some of his intimate touches were exceedingly adroit.  The authors deserve a fair share of the credit.  Indeed there was throughout a suggestion of clever characterisation conspicuously above the average of this genre. Penelope was an excellently developed part, rendered with unexpectedly mature skill by Miss STELLA JESSE.  The Vicar promised at first to be a new type, but the authors seemed to have lost interest in him half-way, and not even Mr. LAWRENCE HANRAY’S skill and restraint could quite save him.  I rate Mr. EADIE as an actor too high to be much amused by him in obviously EADIE parts.  “A man’s reach must exceed his grasp.”  I think it just to Miss HOEY to say that she seemed a little handicapped by efforts of memory, a condition which will duly disappear and leave her charm to assert itself.  Mr. GEORGE HOWARD was quite admirable as a Scots bank manager; Miss BLANCHE STANLEY, a really sound combination of essential good-nature and wounded dignity as a cook on the verge of giving notice.  Miss GERTRUDE STERROLL tackled a vicaress of the Mid-Victorian era (authors’ responsibility this) with a courage which deserves both praise and sympathy.

T.

* * * * *

[Illustration:  THE OPTIMIST.

“IF THIS IS THE RIGHT VILLAGE THEN WE’RE ALL RIGHT.  THE INSTRUCTIONS IS CLEAR—­’GO PAST THE POST-OFFICE AND SHARP TO THE LEFT AFORE YOU COME TO THE CHURCH.’”]

* * * * *

THE AIRMAN.

  Jack loves dreadnoughts, Peggy loves trains,
  But I know what I love—­aeroplanes.

  Jack will sail the high seas if he can stick it;
  Peggy’ll be the girl in blue who asks to see your ticket;
  But I will steer my aeroplane over London town
  And loop the loop till Nurse cries out, “Lor’, Master Jim, come down!”