This story is equalised by one Herbert Hampton told me. He was at Beaconsfield, in Buckinghamshire, and wanted a couple of rooms for a week to rest and do a little sketching; so seeing “Apartments” up at a tiny cottage, he went in. It was a very simple place, clean and tidy, but quite a workman’s home. The woman asked him two guineas a week. Considering the accommodation offered, he thought the price ridiculous. “Come, come, I am not a millionaire,” he said. She looked at him, paused, and replied: “I thought you were a _gentleman_.” * * * * * Sometimes one has utterly unexpected annoyances. Here is an instance of such in my own experience. One day quite lately I was rung up on the telephone, and in the most rude and insulting terms was upbraided for having knocked off a woman’s hat in Regent Street. As I had not been in Regent Street that day, and never knocked off a woman’s hat in my life, I was naturally annoyed. The telephone rang again and again with the same impertinent remarks. This was only the beginning of much trouble. Then came letters, blackmail, I suppose one might call them, and constant telephonic communications and general annoyance. In fact, it became so bad that, after nearly six months, I had to apply to a private detective. He took the matter in hand, and some time later—for though there were addresses, most of them proved to be bogus ones—he succeeded in unearthing the culprit, and the trouble ceased. That was one of the minor annoyances of life. * * * * * Now for one of the minor pleasures; just to balance the worries. Some years ago I employed a gasfitter. The man interested me strangely. He spoke like a gentleman. He had the most beautifully refined hands, he was artistic in everything he did, and while attending to gas-fires, kept excusing himself for making appreciative remarks on good bits of furniture, or beautiful shades of colour. One day he brought me a very old bit of china. It was a little cream jug, good in form, colour, and design. He hoped that I would accept it, as I seemed to appreciate pretty things. This was a little embarrassing, and became more so when his eyes filled with tears and he told me it had belonged to his mother. “Yes, madam, to my mother. I was not born in the circumstances in which you see me,” and then he owned that he was the son of a peer. Beyond that he would not reveal his identity, though he acknowledged that drink was the primary cause that brought him down to where he was. Poor man. He was afterwards taken very ill, and I was able to do a little for him, but he died. And so was buried a strange romance, for the man was by birth a gentleman, in taste an artist, and in speech a poet; and yet circumstances and weakness of character had brought him to this low estate. One instance of the strange stories concerning secret skeletons, locked up in our neighbours’ hearts, naturally leads to another.