Casting himself down lightly by a cabinet worked with Dutch beads interspersed with seed-pearls, and toying with the gnarled handle of the axe, the Right Hon. WILLIAM EWART GLADSTONE tells you the story of his life. At the outset you are a little puzzled to gather where exactly he was born. At first you think it was in Scotland. Anon some town in England claims the honour. Then Wales is incidentally mentioned, and next the tearful voice of Erin claims her son. But, as the story goes forward with long majestic stride, these difficulties fade in the glamour of the Old Man's eloquence, and when you awake and find your host has not yet got beyond the second course--the fish, as it were, of the intellectual banquet--you say you will call again. Mention of the three courses naturally suggests dinner, and as you evidently enjoy the monopoly of the mental association, you take your leave, perhaps regretting that among his wild woodsman accessories your host does not seem to include the midday chop. * * * * * GOLD-TIPPED cigarettes seem just now to be "the swagger thing." "Ah!" Master TOMMY sighed, as he set off for school with only five shillings in his pocket, in consequence of all his dearest--and nearest--relatives being laid up with the prevailing epidemic, "Ah, how I should like to be one of those cigarettes, and then I should be tipped with gold." * * * * * NOTICE.--Rejected Communications or Contributions, whether MS., Printed Matter, Drawings, or Pictures of any description, will in no case be returned, not even when accompanied by a Stamped and Addressed Envelope, Cover, or Wrapper. To this rule there will be no exception.