“I suppose you don’t know it, Mr. BLANK,” you tell him, “but really I can’t help saying it.  You behaved splendidly—­splendidly!”

Droop the eyelashes quickly, and become meditative again.  He will deprecate your compliment a little incoherently.

“Not at all, not at all—­Miss—­er—­ASTERISK—­I really—­assure you—­nothing more than any—­er—­other man would have done.  Some other people at the time told me”—­(laughs nervously)—­“very much—­er—­what you have just said, but—­er—­personally, I—­really—­could never see it, or of course I wouldn’t have mentioned it to you.”

Your rejoinder will depend a good deal on how far you mean to go, and how much of that kind of thing you think you can stand.  If you like, you can drop your handkerchief or your glove when you rise; it will please him to pick it up for you, and he will feel, for a moment, as if he had saved your life.

If you do not want to please the man, but only to show your own superiority, it may perhaps be as well to remember that women are better than men, as a rule, in flat badinage.  Men talk best when they are by themselves, but they are liable to be painfully natural at such times.  I had some little difficulty in finding this out, but I thought it my duty to know, and—­well, I do know.

The correspondence that I have received has not been altogether pleasant.  I have had one letter from ETHEL (aged thirteen) saying that she thinks me a mean sneak for prying into other people’s Diaries.  I can only reply that I was acting for the public good.  I have had a sweet letter, however, from “AZALEA.”  She has been absolutely compelled, by force of circumstances, to allow the distinct attentions of three different men.  She does not give the names of the men, only descriptions, but I should advise her to keep the dark one.  She can see the will at Somerset House.  “JANE” writes to ask what is the best cure for freckles.  I do not answer questions of that kind.  I have replied to my other correspondents privately.

* * * * *

REPULSING THE AMAZONS.

(SEE CARTOON, “ARMING THE AMAZONS,” DEC. 5, 1891.)

[Illustration]

Arming the Amazons against the Greeks? 
That PRIAM SALISBURY tried some few short weeks
Before the present fray.  FAWCETTA fair
Had prayed; the question then seemed “in the air,”
And PRIAM proffered then the Franchise-spear,
(A shadowy one, that gave no grounds for fear,)
To poor PENTHESILEA. 
Now, ah, now
ROLLITTUS moves, there’s going to be a row,
And lo! the mingled ranks of Greece and Troy
Close ’gainst the Amazons.  Her steed, a toy,
A hobby-horse, that any maid may mount,
Is not—­just now—­of any great account. 
Her phantom spear will pierce no stout male mail;
But should ROLLITTUS not—­(confound him!)—­fail,
A female host, well armed, and not on hobbies,