and that’s interesting, because “Plaster of Paris”, of course, is all nonsense. And so is “Plaistow Palace”, as they sometimes call it. The real song goes:-- “Beadle Palace has lost his hat-- Some say this, and some say that....” but the boys twist the words about, because they disremember who Beadle Palace was; and I can’t tell you either. Mr. Perkins, of Framlingham Brothers (Limited), once told me he knew all about it; he said that “Beadle Palace” stands for the Bishop of London, who _really did_ lose his hat one evening; and “some say” it was blown off his head by the wind, and “some say” he gave it to a woman with red hair and a squint, and never got it back again. But he was a bit on, that night, was Mr. Perkins. Or else the Bishop must have been.... These are about a thousand of the outdoor games they play down our way--not a bad number, when you think that our children can only play after they come home from school or work, and that they hardly ever play on Sundays on account of their clothes, or in winter because the evenings are too dark, and that the rain often keeps them indoors anyhow, and that the lads over 14 don’t play at all. And yet, no doubt, I must have forgotten to tell you half of them; and I shall never stop forgetting, if I don’t stop trying to remember.... Now what I think is this. It doesn’t matter how all these sports are played. What matters is that they _are_ played. To show how wide-awake our youngsters are, to be able to go on inventing games out of their heads all the time--that’s the point: my point, at least. The particular rules of all these different games--they don’t strike me as very important, or even interesting.