In the autumn most members of London clubs become wanderers, their houses being given over to painters and decorators, whilst they receive the hospitality of other clubs. A few, amongst which are the National Liberal and the Garrick, never close; and, indeed, the membership of the former is too large for this club to be received by any other. The painting and decorating in clubs which never leave their habitations is done by easy stages, one or two rooms at a time being given over to the workmen engaged upon the renovating process which London smoke renders so necessary. Whilst club-life, on the whole, has become less formal and ceremonious, a certain number of old-established clubs still maintain a grave solemnity of tone, and such institutions generally contain a considerable number of “permanent officials”—the class which, whatever party may nominally be in control, really runs the country. These men, whose lives are passed at various Government Offices, in course of time acquire a peculiar look and manner, so entirely different from that of ordinary humanity that the careful observer and student of the “permanent official” is irresistibly prompted to inquire whether he can ever have been young? The cut of his clothes, his walk, his mannerisms, and the stately slowness of his movements, all betoken a life passed amidst Government forms, schedules, and official papers. Everything he does is prompted by routine, even to the ordering of a generally well-chosen and moderate dinner. As he is perfectly aware of the fact that he belongs to the real ruling caste of the land, the permanent official not unnaturally exudes the dignity which he feels is necessary to his high position. One pictures him in a tornado or an earthquake still speaking in the same measured tones, and briefly asking (for he is generally a man of few words) who is responsible? The permanent official, when married, generally has a very presentable wife, chosen no doubt, like his dinner, with a view to not upsetting the even tenor of his daily round. It is, however, almost impossible to believe that he has ever been in love. If he has, any amorous communications penned by him must, one is sure, have been carefully copied and docketed for future reference. Many permanent officials—but not those of the Foreign Office, who are generally agreeable men of the world—develop into mere automata, radiating a sort of orderly gloom. The majority live to a good age, in latter years evolving into an even less vivacious type—the “retired permanent official”—very solemn and silent, not infrequently pompous, speaking scarcely at all.