* * * * *

PETER AND JUDY.

Except for the fact that they had different sets of parents and were born some hundred miles apart, Peter and Judy are practically twins.  Consequently, after an interval of three months, strenuous efforts were made by the two young mothers to bring about a proper introduction between the two wonders.

The occasion was to be one of great importance, for it was Judy’s very first tea-party, marking, as it were, the dawn of her social career.  For days the post-office wrestled with the correspondence necessary to bring about the meeting.  The mothers, both in person and by proxy, had scoured the precincts of Kensington and Oxford Street respectively for the necessary adornments to do their offspring justice, changing their minds so often that the assistants came to take as much interest in the party as if they were going to it themselves.

And yet, when the great moment arrived and the strong silent man was borne into the room, round-eyed and expectant, he found his hostess already tired out with her first tea-party and fast asleep.  He could scarcely believe his eyes; nor could Judy’s scandalised father.

Peter was very good about it.  He bore this chilly reception stoically, deprecating any desire to wake the sleeping beauty—­deprecating, in fact, any interest in her or her cot whatsoever.  Ignoring the efforts of the Big People to fix his attention by pointing him directly at the main object of the tea-party (they should have known that babies like looking the other way always) he remained passively interested in a fascinating brass knob, the while getting his gloves into a satisfactory state of succulence before the Big People should take it on themselves to remove them.

At last his patience is rewarded.  The hostess, sighing sleepily, is beginning to show signs of realising her responsibilities.  Two immense arms, two enormous fistfuls of fingers gather her up and she is borne through the air triumphantly....  Peter and Judy are introduced.

I doubt whether any two people in this world ever displayed greater indifference.  Solemnly they turn their eyes upon every other object in the room except each other.  It is not until the number of permutations in which two people can look at everything is exhausted mathematically that their eyes meet at last.

Then they cut each other dead.

* * * * *

Side by side they recline on the couch.  Judy, pouting with sleep, is buffeting her face with her little white boxing-gloves, while Peter stares fascinated at the fire, quite sure that social functions are not in his line.  “O-o!”

With only three months’ experience, Judy has not yet attained complete mastery of the art of manipulating difficult things like limbs.  Inadvertently, and in excess of zeal to kick higher than any other baby, she has landed out a beautiful backhander and caught Peter hard in the tummy.  Peter’s eyes open wide.  Creases appear on his face and widen.  A cavern opens and a roar follows:—­