She told him the story of a man wandering through the village seeking a "ludgin," and being exhausted, finally shouted: "Isn't there a 'Chreestian' living in this toon?" Up went a window, and a woman's voice shrieked: "Do ye no ken that there are only Johnstones and Jardines living in the place, ye feckless loon!" Down went the window. VIII LACRYMATORY SHELLS BETHLEHEM, July 23, 1917. A stray Englishman dropped in to see me the other night in New York. I know rather well the girl he had hoped to marry. He seemed rather depressed, and told me that she had written in reply to his proposal of marriage that if he thought that Providence had brought her to her by no means inconsiderable numbers of years especially to be reserved for him, it was obvious that he must regard as extremely shortsighted the Supreme Being guarding the lives of us poor mortals. He seems to have become very depressed and regarded all women as hard hearted tyrants. This lasted for some days and the moving pictures with a love-interest lost all their wonted charm. It was very sad because the lady is an extremely nice girl and very good looking, although she has been to Girton. I don't know anything about the Cambridge women but I have seen a perfectly priceless suffragette from Girton, it was alleged, addressing a crowd in the market square at Cambridge, while a large throng of undergraduates looked at her with much admiration. I remember a low townee fellow said "rats" to one of her statements. She replied with the sweetest smile in the world: "_That's_ an intelligent remark," while a large football player took revenge on the chap. From all this you will gather that I know but little about the womenfolk of Blighty. I have never thought very much about them nor studied their habits. However, over here in America our countrywomen are well known by their female cousins. The American girl does not think much about the English girl, except to admire and like her accent, but the mature American women who thinks at all wonders a little at the docility towards their men folk shown by our women. I love to tease them about it. An American man observed to me once that England was "heaven for horses, but hell for women."