Her Friend.  So do I. We might send one ’ere by post—­but it’ll have to be a New Year Card now!

A Strict Old Lady (before next group).  Who are these two?  “Mr.  ’ENERY IRVING, and Miss ELLEN TERRY in Faust,” eh?  No—­I don’t care to stop to see them—­that’s play-actin’, that is—­and I don’t ’old with it nohow!  What are these two parties supposed to be doin’ of over here?  What—­Cardinal NEWMAN and Cardinal MANNING at the High Altar at the Oratory, Brompton!  Come along, and don’t encourage Popery by looking at such figures.  I did ’ear as they’d got Mrs. PEARCEY and the prambilator somewheres.  I should like to see that, now.

IN THE CHILDREN’S GALLERY.

An Aunt (who finds the excellent Catalogue a mine of useful information).  Look, BOBBY, dear (reading).  “Here we have CONSTANTINE’S Cat, as seen in the ‘Nights of Straparola,’ an Italian romancist, whose book was translated into French in the year 1585—­”

Bobby (disappointed).  Oh, then it isn’t Puss in Boots!

A Genial Grandfather (pausing before “Crusoe and Friday").  Well, PERCY, my boy, you know who that is, at all events—­eh?

Percy.  I suppose it is STANLEY—­but it’s not very like.

The G.G. STANLEY!—­Why, bless my soul, never heard of Robinson Crusoe and his man Friday?

Percy.  Oh, I’ve heard of them, of course—­they come in Pantomimes—­but I like more grown-up sort of books myself, you know.  Is this girl asleep She?

The G.G. No—­at least—­well, I expect it’s “The Sleeping Beauty.”  You remember her, of course—­all about the ball, and the glass slipper, and her father picking a rose when the hedge grew round the palace, eh?

Percy.  Ah, you see, Grandfather, you had more time for general reading than we get. (He looks through a practicable cottage window.) Hallo, a Dog and a Cat.  Not badly stuffed!

The G.G. Why that must be “Old Mother Hubbard.” (Quoting from memory.) “Old Mother Hubbard sat in a cupboard, eating a Christmas pie—­or a bone was it?”

Percy.  Don’t know.  It’s not in Selections from British Poetry, which we have to get up for “rep.”

The Aunt (reading from Catalogue).  “The absurd ambulations of this antique person, and the equally absurd antics of her dog, need no recapitulation.”  Here’s “Jack the Giant Killer” next.  Listen, BOBBY, to what it says about him here. (Reads.) “It is clearly the last transmutation of the old British legend told by GEOFFREY of Monmouth, of CORINEUS the Trojan, the companion of the Trojan BRUTUS, when he first settled in Britain.  But more than this”—­I hope you’re listening, BOBBY?—­“more than this, it is quite evident, even to the superficial student of Greek mythology, that many of the main incidents and ornaments are borrowed from the tales of HESIOD and HOMER.”  Think of that, now!