I'm afraid I have not yet found time to visit West Africa, but I still hope to. When I do, I will perhaps let you have some tales "hot from the oven." In the meantime I find the Travel section of our local library a more comfortable and probably a more accurate source of copy. But I still have to draw on my imagination to some extent. The Mendes may be pure Yanks for all I know to the contrary; but I hope for their own sakes they aren't Zishtis. It sounds such a horrible thing to be. As for the "leopard" murders, I got my information from Major Kingsley, D.S.O., who has been a Government officer in Nigeria and Sierra Leone for fourteen years, so there may be something in it. As he is a close friend of mine I sent my story to him out there for him to look through before letting you have it, and he very kindly posted it direct to you. He has written to tell me that the ignorance shown in it was such as to preclude any possibility of improvement by revision. By the way, Major Kingsley was the author of _Red Shadows_. He asked me as a special favour to godfather it, as he believed an unknown writer stood no chance. It is a perfectly true story. My kindest regards to your expert. Yours very truly, AUBREY ASTON. * * * * * [Illustration: FLOWERS OF SPEECH (U.S.A.). _Wealthy American Westerner_ (_anxious to show his great appreciation of the able and enthusiastic way in which the duchess has pleaded the cause of her pet charity_). "WAAL, GOOD-BYE, DUCHESS. I WILL SEND YOU A CHEQUE, SURE. I GUESS SOME OF THESE CHARITIES WOULDN'T BE SO SICK IF THEY HAD CRAZY BOOMERS LIKE YOU TO BOOST 'EM ALONG."] * * * * * "Many correspondents have asked whether Mrs. Cornwallis received this compensation because her husband was a reader of this journal."--_Daily Mail._ Could they have meant--correspondents being notoriously rude--that the husband deserved it more? * * * * * A CHARM (_whereby a modern male adult mortal may be pleasantly initiated into the fairy state_).