Page:Punch Vol 148.djvu/304

Visitor. "Is it a boy or a girl?"

Patriotic Mother. "Oh, a boy, Miss. We don't want girls nowadays, and doctor says everybody's having boys."

"Oh, Mr. Meyer," said my hostess, 'you are so clever, you must think of a new game for us."

If there is any form of request more paralysing than this, I should like to hear of it. So clever! To be called so clever in a company containing several strangers, and then to have to prove it! Surely tact should be taught at schools, although, of course, after logarithms.

By some bewildering miracle an idea suddenly entered my head. "Why not play at 'Sister Susie'?" I said.

"You don't mean more sewing?" my hostess replied in dismay.

"No, no," I explained, seeing daylight as I talked. "First we want twenty-six little bits of paper. Will someone tear them up? Then on these we write the letters of the alphabet. Then they are put in a hat and shaken up, and we take out one each in turn. As there are twelve of us we shall have two each, and two of us will have three each, to make the twenty-six. Is that all clear?'

They said it was as clear as mud, and I went through it again with the crystal clarity of a teacher of one of those advertised systems which impart a perfect knowledge of French in three lessons.

"Then," I said, "you take a sheet of paper and fill up a line for each of your two (or it may be three) letters, in the manner of the famous Sister Susie line, which I am told is sung wherever the sun never sets:―

That is to say," I added, "that supposing you had A you might write―

or if B:―

It must be alliterative; it must be as much in the metre of the Sister Susie line as possible; and it must have reference to the War."

The company having intimated that this also was as clear as mud, I repeated it.

"But what about X?" a pretty girl asked.

"Yes, and Z?" asked someone else.

"And Y?" asked a third.

"I felt sure there would be some defects in the game," I replied. "We are only feeling our way, you see. We had better leave them out."

"Oh no," said Aunt Eliza; let's try them."

Aunt Eliza spends quite half of her life in guessing acrostics and anagrams, and the difficulties of writing-games are food and drink to her.

Then the inevitable happened.

"Oh, but I can't play this," said one guest who had just begun to grasp its character.

"I'm sure I can't," said another.

"I'm hopelessly stupid."

"You must leave us out," they said.

Ten minutes having passed in fighting to retain them, during which time a third and fourth took courage and fell out too, we settled down to the hat with only eight players. That is to say, we were each to have three letters, and Aunt Eliza and I, being the most gifted, were to share X and Z.

We were just beginning when the pretty girl wanted to know how we were to manage about relationships. "'Sister Susie' is all right," she said, "and 'Auntie Alice' and 'Cousin Connie,' but there aren't any more; unless we say 'Father Freddy' and 'Mother Molly,' and 'Brother Bertie' and 'Uncle Ulrich.'"

It was therefore decided to cut out relationships and begin with the girls' names right away.

And so we started, five minutes being allowed. I saw at once that Z was useless. Zoe and Zuleika could be found easily enough, but there was nothing to set them to do. I therefore concentrated on my other letters, which were U and J, and with infinite agonies produced:―

and

Our hostess came out strong with C:―

and G was very passable:―

Y was ingenious but not of the best:―

I need hardly say that Aunt Eliza played it best. Aunts always do play this kind of game best. Her three letters were P, S and X. The first two she rendered thus:"―

and

"But what about X?" we demanded.

"X isn't really possible," she said. "Xantippe is the only name, and there are no verbs for her.

is all I can do."

Perhaps other players will get better results.

"The view of the Euxine from the heights of Terapia, just seen through the end of the Straits, is like grazing upon eternity."

Devon and Exeter Gazette.

In the Elysian Fields, we presume.

"Dr. Macnamara, in reply, stated that there had been no case of tetanus at Osborne and no epidemic, but only isolated cases of the form of conjunctivitis, alluded to Lord Charles as 'pink eye,' during the last two years."―Isle of Wight Evening News.

This regrettable personality, continued over so long a period, should surely by this time have reached the ears of the Speaker.