Punch, or the London Charivari

of the earth. Every noise which arises in the kitchen, from Elizabeth's badinage with the butcher's boy to the raucous grind of the knife-machine, echoes through the house viâ the study where I work.

Thus, although Elizabeth kept the kitchen-door shut, I found myself compelled for one-half of the day to consider an insistent demand as to the ultimate destination of flies in the winter-time. The rest of the day the gramophone gave us K-K-K-Katie. (Elizabeth had only two records to begin with.)

I became unnerved. My work suffered. It began to trickle back to me accompanied by the regrets of editors; and to writers the regrets of editors are the most poignant in the world.

The situation was saved by the most up-to-date tout of the whole back-door tribe. He persuaded Elizabeth to go in for Spiritualism. Do not misunderstand me. You can be a Spiritualist and also keep a gramophone, but, if you are Elizabeth, you cannot keep the two running at the same time if you must p