This left us with fourteen pages (dotted up and down the book) still missing.  I waited awhile longer, and then put the thing into the hands of a solicitor, who soon found the man, but could get nothing but promises from him.  “You will never get the blocks,” said the solicitor, “unless you frighten him by a summons before a magistrate.”  To this at last I unwillingly consented:  the summons had to be taken out at—­(that is where this aggravating man is living), and this entailed two journeys from Eastbourne—­one to get the summons (my personal presence being necessary), and the other to attend in court with the solicitor on the day fixed for hearing the case.  The defendant didn’t appear; so the magistrate said he would take the case in his absence.  Then I had the new and exciting experience of being put into the witness-box, and sworn, and cross-examined by a rather savage magistrate’s clerk, who seemed to think that, if he only bullied me enough, he would soon catch me out in a falsehood!  I had to give the magistrate a little lecture on photo-zincography, and the poor man declared the case was so complicated he must adjourn it for another week.  But this time, in order to secure the presence of our slippery defendant, he issued a warrant for his apprehension, and the constable had orders to take him into custody and lodge him in prison, the night before the day when the case was to come on.  The news of this effectually frightened him, and he delivered up the fourteen negatives (he hadn’t done the blocks) before the fatal day arrived.  I was rejoiced to get them, even though it entailed the paying a second time for getting the fourteen blocks done, and withdrew the action.

The fourteen blocks were quickly done and put into the printer’s hands; and all is going on smoothly at last:  and I quite hope to have the book completed, and to be able to send you a very special copy (bound in white vellum, unless you would prefer some other style of binding) by the end of the month.

    Believe me always,

    Sincerely yours,

    C. L. Dodgson.

“The Game of Logic” was Lewis Carroll’s next book; it appeared about the end of February, 1887.  As a method of teaching the first principles of Logic to children it has proved most useful; the subject, usually considered very difficult to a beginner, is made extremely easy by simplification of method, and both interesting and amusing by the quaint syllogisms that the author devised, such as—­

      No bald person needs a hair-brush;
      No lizards have hair;
        Therefore[1] No lizard needs a hair brush.

      Caterpillars are not eloquent;
      Jones is eloquent;
          Jones is not a caterpillar.

Meanwhile, with much interchange of correspondence between author and artist, the pictures for the new fairy tale, “Sylvie and Bruno,” were being gradually evolved.  Each of them was subjected by Lewis Carroll to the most minute criticism—­hyper-criticism, perhaps, occasionally.  A few instances of the sort of criticisms he used to make upon Mr. Furniss’s work may be interesting; I have extracted them from a letter dated September 1, 1887.  It will be seen that when he really admired a sketch he did not stint his praise:—­