From your description of your picture we imagine it to be one of those on which these two clever artists collaborated. It would, however, be wiser to take it to one of the experts than to bring it to a noisy and restless newspaper office. We recommend either Sir SIDNEY COLVIN, Sir CHARLES HOLROYD or Sir CLAUDE PHILLIPS. As a precaution against the negligible risk mentioned in the second part of your query we advise you, when submitting the picture to these gentlemen, to have it chained to your body. A DELICATE TRIAL OF TACT. _The other day I had lunch with an uncle with whom I wish to be on the best of terms. I should say that he fancies himself as a judge of wine. We went to a restaurant and he ordered champagne, which came, already opened, in an ice-basket. When the wine was poured out he tasted it, smacked his lips and said, "That's perfect! What a bouquet! What an aroma!" I sipped and found it most vilely corked. I also noticed that the waiter was grinning, and I then realized that he knew it too, and that we had been given a bottle which someone else had rejected. What was I to do? If I told my uncle that the wine was corked he would be furious to have been detected in an error of judgment. If I did not drink it he would be furious too. If I did drink it I should be sick, and I should also be a fool in the eyes of the waiter. If nothing was said the restaurant people would profit by their low trick. Meanwhile uncle was sipping and beaming.--P. E. L. (Norbiton)._ Your problem is a very interesting one and we should find it easier to answer if you had told us what you actually did. To rise suddenly, apparently for the purpose of flinging your arms round your uncle's neck in a spasm of affection, and at the same time to sweep from the table the bottle and both glasses seems to us the course which possesses most elements of tact. The circumstance that you were inspired by admiration and love would mitigate your uncle's wrath, and a new and sound bottle could quickly be obtained. We admit that the restaurant would remain unpunished; but then that is a restaurant's _metier_. OLD BOOKS. _I have recently turned up in a loft the following books: "Complete Farrier," LAW'S "Serious Call," "Robinson Crusoe," WESLEY'S "Hymns," "The Shipwreck," by FALCONER, two odd volumes of "The Spectator," and PRENDERGAST'S "Sermons." All are very old, dirty and worm-eaten, and I feel sure must therefore be very valuable. Can you say what I am likely to get for them from a good dealer?--E. G. (Croydon)._ Fourpence for the lot. MR. KIPLING. _Kindly tell me if the Mr. KIPLING who has been making such a splendid speech about the Cabinet and their mercenariness and the treacherous nature of the Irish is the same Mr. KIPLING who wrote "The Recessional" and "Without Benefit of Clergy"? Some one here says that he is, but I doubt it.--A. L. D. (Swindon)._