There, I think I've answered fairly every question on your list; All their meaning I have mastered, there's not one of them I've missed. I'm a sulphur-headed sunbeam, with a taste for pretty clocks, Which I always tell the time by when they strike upon the box. * * * * * Mrs. R. doubled up her _Times_ for convenience of handling, and came upon this sentence where the paper folded: "Individuals grown in tubs in greenhouses, in cool climates, have been known to live over a hundred years." She paused. "Good Heavens!" she exclaimed; "it's as remarkable as the history of the old hermits who used to live perched up on the tops of pillars! But if ever these very clean individuals did live in 'tubs' for over a hundred years, what possible good could they have been to anybody, or even to themselves!" Turning the paper over Mrs. R. found that the letter was headed "American Aloes." * * * * * [Illustration: REAL SYMPATHY. _'Arry (reading account of the War in the East)._ "OW, I S'Y, 'ARRIET, THEY'VE BIN AN' TOOK OLD LI 'UNG CHANG'S THREE-HEYED PEACOCK'S FEATHERS ALL OFF 'IM!" _'Arriet (compassionately)._ "PORE OLD FELLER!"] * * * * * TO AMANDA. AMANDA, I, your faithful slave, Am grieved by the conviction That you expect me to behave As lovers do in fiction, To falter forth my vows sincere In syllables disjointed; My more prosaic speech, I fear, Will leave you disappointed. I ought, I candidly allow, In sitting-rooms and places To stride about with gloomy brow And agitated paces; But in athletic sports I'm sure I always was a duffer, And, if I tried, your furniture Most certainly would suffer. To prove the tenderness I feel My duty is, I know, to Leave quite untasted every meal, And breakfast off your photo; But habit proves, alas, too strong! With appetite unshaken I still attack (I know it's wrong) My matutinal bacon. Again; I clearly ought to try To immolate a rival, And prove my special fitness by A process of survival; My cowardice I much deplore, But still, romantic fury Would scarcely pay, when brought before An unromantic jury. So, if your courage still insists On scorning thoughts prudential, And you regard the novelists' Commandments as essential, With some more daring person live; For me, a brief perusal Of modern fiction makes me give A kind but firm refusal! * * * * * LETTERS FROM A DÉBUTANTE.