CAPT. G. Hab! Would you really like to know? They aren't pretty things. MRS. G. This Journal of Veterinary Science says they are of “absorbing interest.” Tell me. CAPT. G. (Aside.) It may turn her attention. Gives a long and designedly loathsome account of glanders and farcy. MRS. G. Oh, that's enough. Don't go on! CAPT. G. But you wanted to know--Then these things suppurate and matterate and spread-- MRS. G. Pin, you're making me sick! You're a horrid, disgusting schoolboy. CAPT. G. (On his knees among the bridles.) You asked to be told. It's not my fault if you worry me into talking about horrors. MRS. G. Why didn't you say--No? CAPT. G. Good Heavens, child! Have you come in here simply to bully me? MRS. G. I bully you? How could I! You're so strong. (Hysterically.) Strong enough to pick me up and put me outside the door and leave me there to cry. Aren't you? CAPT. G. It seems to me that you're an irrational little baby. Are you quite well? MRS. G. Do I look ill? (Returning to table). Who is your lady friend with the big grey envelope and the fat monogram outside? CAPT. G. (Aside.) Then it wasn't locked up, confound it. (Aloud.) “God made her, therefore let her pass for a woman.” You remember what farcybuds are like? MRS. G. (Showing envelope.) This has nothing to do with them. I'm going to open it. May I? CAPT. G. Certainly, if you want to. I'd sooner you didn't though. I don't ask to look at your letters to the Deer-court girl. MRS. G. You'd better not, Sir! (Takes letter from envelope.) Now, may I look? If you say no, I shall cry. CAPT. G. You've never cried in my knowledge of you, and I don't believe you could. MRS. G. I feel very like it to-day, Pip. Don't be hard on me. (Reads letter.) It begins in the middle, without any “Dear Captain Gadsby,” or anything. How funny! CAPT. G. (Aside.) No, it's not Dear Captain Gadsby, or anything, now. How funny! MRS. G. What a strange letter! (Reads.) “And so the moth has come too near the candle at last, and has been singed into--shall I say Respectability? I congratulate him, and hope he will be as happy as he deserves to be.” What does that mean? Is she congratulating you about our marriage? CAPT. G. Yes, I suppose so. MRS. G. (Still reading letter.) She seems to be a particular friend of yours. CAPT. G. Yes. She was an excellent matron of sorts--a Mrs. Herriott--wife of a Colonel Herriott. I used to know some of her people at Home long ago--before I came out. MRS. G. Some Colonel's wives are young--as young as me. I knew one who was younger. CAPT. G. Then it couldn't have been Mrs. Herriott. She was old enough to have been your mother, dear. MRS. G. I remember now. Mrs. Scargill was talking about her at the Dutfins' tennis, before you came for me, on Tuesday. Captain Mafflin said she was a “dear old woman.” Do you know, I think Mafilin is a very clumsy man with his feet. CAPT. G. (Aside.) Good old Jack! (Aloud.) Why, dear?