as new doors were so apt to stick, and she didn’t know what she should do if she had to struggle over the opening.  I comforted her by telling her she would only have to say a few brief words on a platform, declaring the Bazaar open.  For the last week I have had a letter from her by absolutely every post, sending draft speeches for my approval.  After much consideration I selected one of these, which I returned to her.  I heard from home that she was very busily occupied for some time in learning it by heart.  When cook came for orders in the morning, she was forced to listen while Mother said over the speech to her.  Cook was good enough to express a high opinion of its beauties.

Yesterday evening Mother arrived, with the usual enormous amount of luggage, including the inevitable Carlo.  After dinner I heard her repeat the speech, which went off very well.  This is it:—­“Ladies and Gentlemen, I am so pleased to be here to-day, and to have the opportunity of helping the dear Conservative cause in Billsbury.  I am sure you are all so anxious to buy as many of these lovely things as you can, and I therefore lose no time in declaring the Bazaar open.”  Simple, but efficient.

The opening to-day was fixed for 2:30, the Bazaar being held in the large room of the Assembly Rooms, which had been arranged to represent an Old English Tillage.  At one o’clock Colonel and Mrs. CHORKLE, Alderman and Mrs. TOLLAND, and one or two others, lunched with us, and afterwards we all drove off together in a procession of carriages.  I insisted on Carlo being left behind, locked up in Mother’s bed-room, with a dish of bones to comfort him, and an old dress of Mother’s to lie on.  That old dress has been devoted to Carlo for the last two years, and no amount of persuasion will induce Carlo to take another instead.  We tried him with a much better one a short time ago, but he was furious, tore it to ribbons and refused his food until his old disreputable dress had been restored to him.

The Bazaar proceedings began with a short prayer delivered by the Bishop of BRITISH GUIANA, an old Billsbury Grammar-School boy, who was appointed to the bishopric a month ago.  Everybody is making a tremendous fuss about him here of course.  As soon as the prayer was over, Colonel CHORKLE rose and made what he would call one of his “’appiest hefforts.”  The influence of lovely woman, Conservative principles, devotion to the Throne, the interests of the Conservative Young Men’s Sustentation Fund, all mixed up together like a hasty pudding.  Then came the moment for Mother.  First, however, WILLIAMINA HENRIETTA SMITH CHORKLE had to be removed outside for causing a disturbance.  Her father’s speech so deeply affected this intelligent infant, who had come under the protection of her nurse, that she burst out into a loud yell and refused to be comforted.  The Colonel’s face was a study—­a mixture of drum-head Courts-martial and Gatling guns.  Mother got through