said to have rather prided himself on his military appearance, and the car-drivers of Dublin used to humour this small foible by addressing him as Major' or 'Colonel,' or even 'General,' in the hope of getting an extra shilling or two out of him. He told Dean Dickinson how he had once, just for the fun of the thing, offered a cabman his legal fare (which happened to be sixpence). The man, who had recognised Mr. Barnardo, had been piling on military titles all the way along, and was confidently expecting to receive at least half-a-crown; he was therefore rather disgusted, and gave free vent to his feelings. Gineral indeed!' he sneered. 'Faix, you're no Gineral! no nor Colonel nayther! Yer' nothin' but an ould Boa-Consthructor! that's what y'are.' This was not so much a term of abuse as a plain statement of fact. But there was evidently some confusion in the man's mind between a furrier, or person who constructs boas, and the big serpent of that name; and the man clearly wished to convey an impression. of scorn and derision.

An English traveller, new to the country, was driving on a car from Kingstown to the house where he was to stay, a few miles inland. Were you born in Dublin?' he asked the carman. 'Not altogether,' was the immediate reply. Another carman, driving a fare through the streets of Dublin, was asked, on passing a distinguished-looking lady in a carriage-and-pair, 'Is that "her Ex."?' 'It is not, sorr! Begorrah! I'm thinkin' that's her "double X.'

I can vouch for the truth of the following: A rich American, travelling in Ireland, had heard much about the exorbitant demands of the Dublin car-drivers. He was told that no matter what you gave them, they always asked for more! Thinking to test the truth of this, he handed the man half-a-sovereign for a five-minutes' drive. The driver was equal to the occasion, and, concealing his ecstasy, he merely observed, with a twinkle in his eye, Sure, your honour wouldn't have me break that wid dhrinkin' your honour's health?' Let us hope the hint was duly taken.

A

But I have known even a Dublin carman outwitted. Mr. L., returning from Cambridge, took a car at Westland Row to drive to his home in Fitzwilliam Square, a couple of hundred yards distant. His beautiful English (as the old song says) must have led the carman to take him for a visitor to Dublin; for he drove him half-way round the town, pointing out the various objects of interest on the way. Mr. L. played up, and feigned the deepest interest in all he was shown and told, but, on arriving at his destination after an hour's pleasant drive, he handed the man the legal fare from Westland Row to Fitzwilliam Square, observing as he did so, 'The next time you're up to your tricks,

my man, you'd better make sure it isn't a Dublin gentleman you've got hold of."

I believe it is commonly supposed that no Irish man or woman ever opens his mouth without letting fall some pearl of price in the shape of a 'bull' or other unconscious witticism. This is perhaps a slight exaggeration, but one does now and again come across a genuine specimen. I once had the good fortune to overhear one myself. Two working-men were walking close behind me in Stephen's Green, and one said to the other, I niver seen sich times! What wid the cowld, an' what wid wan thing an' another, there's people dyin' now that niver died befower.' Bulls are certainly in the very air one breathes in Ireland, and that among all classes. A friend once explained to me how that my mother was the only one of my aunts who was ever married.' She could see nothing amiss with the sentence, and was decidedly annoyed at the smiles which greeted it. (But, after all, as a 'bull' was it any worse than Milton's fairest of her daughters Eve,' or the remark of Thucydides that the Peloponnesian War was the greatest of those that had gone before?) My husband was one day trying to find a place in the electric tramway from Portrush to the golf-course, but was told by the conductor, Sure, there's no seats here barrin' ye'd stand.' A friend sends me the following small 'bull,' which he considers only worthy to be called a 'calf': A day of downpour comes back to me when the lane I had thought of taking as a short cut had become the bed of a mountain torrent. "Can I get across to Annamoy, my good woman?" I asked of a cottager. "Ye can, sorr, an' ye'd have it fine an' dhry too, sorr, barrin' that it's rainin'.'

Native courtesy extracted another 'calf' from an Irishman whom Mr. Balfour once accosted on a country road. He had, I believe, noticed the Irish peculiarity of always assenting to everything that is said, and he set himself to get a contradiction out of the man by observing to him, 'It's a fine day, Pat' (when it was raining cats and dogs). Well, it is, yer honour, but it 'ud be finer if it wasn't rainin',' was Pat's reply.

The sanguine Irish nature is well exemplified in the following utterance of a Dublin house-painter, who was being called over the coals for some crooked lines which he had painted on a decoration he was working at. Dumbfounded, and scratching his head in much perplexity, he suddenly had a happy inspiration. 'Sure, mebbe they'll dhry sthraight.' Doesn't one sometimes entertain similar hopes about things in life that have gone askew? A lodge-keeper's wife, who was on bad terms with the steward, and was given to vivid expressions, was asked whether So-and-so was unpopular in the neighbourhood. 'Well, sir, it's just this

way; if Mr. was to get on fire, there isn't a man or woman in the counthry that 'ud waste a spittle to put him out.' The same woman had a quarrel with another woman about a boundary. The master visited the premises, and decided the matter against the first woman. Both women were vociferous in their gratitude to the master for his kindness in making up their quarrel, and at his request they shook hands there and then, thanking him again and again. Then the defeated woman said, 'I thank you, sorr, wid all me heart, but it's sorry I am that your honour has decided the matther in favour of a hell-sarpint like her.' There comes to my mind the saying of an old coachman in the country about a spindle-shanked young squire who usually wore knickerbockers. Faith, I'm thinking that young gintleman must have the courage of July-us Sayzer to go about in them legs.' The same old coachman prescribed a remarkable cure for a cold. 'Ye'd just take as much butther as 'ud fit on a sixpence, an' ye'd mix it up in a glass o' punch, an' swally it down hot an' sthrong, an' I give ye me word, if ye could see into th' inside o' ye, ye'd see that butther an' that punch dhrivin' the could forenint them through yer intherdles like a fog.'

For English readers who may be ignorant of suburban Dublin geography the following story needs some explanation. 'The Rock' is a familiar appellation for 'Blackrock,' a township which, being distant some five or six miles from Dublin, is one of the resorts for bona-fide travellers' entitled to be served with drink on Sunday. The speaker, a Dublin charwoman, was giving evidence in the magistrate's court about an assault made upon her by her husband. 'O' Sunda' night, yer honour, Himself o come back bonafied out o' the Rock, an' went fur t' open me head wid a plate '-treating the two Latin words as one: a single trisyllabic past participle like 'purified' or 'pacified.'

The following may be commended to the leaders of the 'suffragette' movement (or to the anti-suffragettes, whichever way the reader likes to take it). A scuffle was going on among a group of slatternly washerwomen down a side alley. A bystander inquired of the policeman at the corner, What's the matter down there?' The policeman, in a voice of lofty contempt, replied, Och, sure, the women in these parts is gone to blazes intirely since the Recordther gave their husbands three months' for batin' thim.'

My closing story has no particular raison d'être, but is too characteristic to be omitted. It is merely an Irish servant's description of his master's first attempt at driving a motor. ‘He run full tilt into the face o' the wall, an' the shoffer's face got

8 The head of the family is generally alluded to (by his wife only) as 'Himself.'

8

as yalla' as a duck's leg, an' the stepney wheel was huntin' the schoolchildher down the hill.'

But it is high time to bring this rambling and discursive farrago to a close; and I have only to apologise to any reader who may have struggled thus far for the rather disjointed nature of the thing. It is difficult in so limited a space to avoid merely cataloguing the various good sayings without touching, as one would like to do, upon the nature and character of the men and women who uttered them. One would have liked also, had time permitted, to try and dispel one at least of the beliefs current among Anglo-Saxons about all the Celtic races (more especially the Irish), that they habitually wear their hearts upon their sleeves. This is very far from being the case. No Englishman ever gives credit to Irish folk for the depth of the reserve which, in all classes, lies below the apparent outspokenness. Such reserve one has learned-whether rightly or wrongly-to consider as a special attribute of the educated in both countries, but in Ireland it may be said to exist among all classes. It anyhow helps one to realise that the Irish servant, whichever sex he belongs to, is a thorough gentleman; with which diminutive 'calf' I will conclude.

CAROLINE A. LYTTELTON.

BEHIND THE PURDÂ

Now that the mind of England has been thoroughly stirred up on the subject of reforms in Indian administration, there is perhaps an opportunity for drawing attention to certain evils about which no clamour is, or in the nature of things can be, raised, but which nevertheless affect very grievously the happiness and welfare of millions of our fellow-subjects in that country.

There are in India a vast number of women, widows and minors, many of them owning a large amount of property, who have no adequate protection in their rights and who are often subject to outrageous swindling and oppression. It should be understood that a large proportion of Indian women are what is styled purdā-nashin, or purdā-women, i.e. women of the curtain.' These are women who are above the class of the ordinary coolie or working-woman, and who live in seclusion. The practice extends with more or less strictness through the whole of India, but chiefly over the North, the United Provinces, and the Native States. The purdă lady is withdrawn from the outer world to an extent hardly to be understood by those who have never lived in the East. She cannot be seen unveiled by men, except very near relations; she cannot appear outside the house, except closely wrapped up with her face carefully covered. If it should be absolutely necessary for her to have an interview on business with one of the opposite sex, she can only converse with him while she is behind an opaque purda. Besides this, living from childhood in the seclusion of the zenana or women's portion of the house, equivalent to the Turkish harem (forbidden), she grows up curiously ignorant of the conditions of ordinary life.

Marriage in India is universal; consequently the number of widows is very large and they now amount to more than twentyfive millions. The number of minors who have lost their fathers or are orphans must be also very great. According to the custom in India any property owned by these classes is managed by men called mukhtars or native agents. These men, who are often extremely dishonest and unscrupulous, naturally find a door widely open to fraud and chicanery in the conditions of zenana life. It is true that the law will help the purda woman if she