“Switzerland! the awful mountains piercing the sapphire with their silver pinnacles--earth’s knives thrust into heaven’s bosom! The cows with their tinkling bells leaping from crag to crag! The crimson sunsets, the purple nights! The still lagoons with their gondolas, the Northern lights, the white palaces----” “But,” said Ginger. “Hush!” said Gypsy, taking her on his knee. “Music over the water ... the siesta at noon ... the click of castanets, the serenata ... the rugged firs be-diamonded with frost, the orange groves in flower ... the Aurora Borealis....” The P.A.’s voice trailed off and his eyes closed. That night when their friends had gone, Ginger got down the little red pillar-box and looked defiantly at Gypsy. But Gypsy only said, “If you can’t shake it out we’ll prise it open with the fork.” However, with a good deal of shaking they got out three-and-elevenpence, and that was practically all it contained. “I’m afraid it won’t quite run to Switzerland,” said Gypsy. “No,” said Ginger, “but it will to Salmon--Scotch. And I don’t _want_ it to run to Switzerland. It would be simply brutal to send him to Switzerland.” “Yes, we mustn’t be iconoclasts,” said Gypsy. “Iconoclasts?” inquired Ginger. “The antitheses of Cook and Lunn, darling. But salmon--” “Antitheses?” interpolated Ginger. “There really isn’t time, darling. Salmon--” “Then talk in words of one syllable,” said Ginger. “Now what about salmon?” “Salmon,” said Gypsy, “is safe. It’s only the Canadians who put it in tins that are iconoclasts about salmon. I don’t see how any pavement picture of the very middlest cut could be better than the real thing, do you?” Ginger agreed that salmon was safe. But the P.A. didn’t. When the following night he asked for a sausage, and Ginger shyly offered him a pink slice of Scotch with a coronet of cucumber all the way round, his eyes dilated. But he shook his head. “My dear,” he said, “do you know what are the two worst things in life?” “Not salmon and cucumber, surely?” pleaded Ginger. “No,” said he. “But not having what you want, and having it.” He put the plate from him. “‘Rather endure those evils’--I can’t argue about it,” he said abruptly, “I only know that if your salmon were one whit more or less delicious than mine, I should never chalk salmon on pavement again. And what would then be left me to do for a living?” “S’rimps,” said the Rag-and-Bone Man. “Potboiling!” said the P. A. “Can one dream of shrimps? A sausage, please.” Artists are so hopelessly unpractical. [Illustration: 2. The Taxi-Man GYPSY AND GINGER’S FRIENDS] This episode in the lives of Gypsy and Ginger ought really to be called _Tales of an Old Adventure_. For that, if they could believe him, was what the Taxi-Man was.