neatly. Then there fluttered up from a bush between us a woodcock, and crossing me gave me an easy shot which brought him into the larder. A little further another hare fell to my companion. Then we came to a small hollow, evidently well watered, filled with thorn bush, rank yellow grass, and a few green bushes which looked like holly. Hadji Ano and I stationed ourselves outside this cover and sent the boys in to act as spaniels. Presently, with a silent whisk, a rich brown woodcock flitted past me, and then so suddenly changed his course as to escape the shower of shot with, which I saluted him. But no

less than three more birds came out of the same spinney, two to me and one to the Hadji, and these were all accounted for. As we went on a tempting reach of reedy swamp received our attention, and here we had some very pretty snipe-shooting. Alert they were as in the morning, but they did not fly far on the first rise, and my present companions, keen and silent, were very different from the noisy Frenchmen. As a consequence we soon began to run up quite a little bag. We had no dog, but slow and careful walking got the birds up nicely, and the Arab boys were as sharp as needles in marking and retrieving fallen game.

Anon we came to a long and narrow belt of thorn bushes lining both banks of the streamlet. Hadj Ano took one side and I the other, the boys working along in the bush, tapping as they went. Four shots at intervals from Hadj Ano's gun began to make me impatient of my own silence, but at last a long bill rose within the thorns and came to my side, and gave an easy shot as he turned to wing along the side of the cover; almost where he fell another rose, and gave a long shot for my left barrel. I should probably have missed him had it been my right, but, as it was, he too bit the dust.

On and on we went, getting every now and then a shot at cock, until at length the sun began to sink towards his setting, and we had wandered far from camp. Then we turned and, as far as the light would allow us, shot our way back towards the tents. Out of a reedy pool we got a mallard and his mate, and a little further on a woodcock, probably a wounded one, rose from bare ground at our approach, and fell, after a twisty flight, to my second barrel. Soon after the sun had set a whistle of golden plover sounded suddenly near, and as they rushed overhead we stopped a couple and a half.

That was our last and perhaps most satisfactory shot of what had been in the end a very satisfactory day.

Darkness had set in before we reached the trees where lay our camp. As this was still some five miles from the farm, and my pony was feeling one of his legs after the marching from Bizerta, I gave way to the suggestion of Hadj Ano, and made up my mind to spend the night in camp.

A note to this effect was despatched by one of his men to quiet the anxiety of my French friends at the farm, and I sat down with a clear conscience and an appreciative appetite to the repast prepared by the Hadji's cook-boy. Hadj Ano had meanwhile changed his shooting clothes for his native Arab dress which he always wore at home.

Then followed one of those delights which only come too seldom into one's experience-to lie at one's ease in the cold, clear night by a warm and cheerful camp fire. The restfulness of it appeals to every joint in the tired sportsman's frame, while his mind is amused by the quaint tales and plaintive songs with which the Arabs pass away an hour or two.

Then, warm and sleepy, one rolls into one's blanket to sleep off all fatigue and gather fresh energy from the pure fresh air of one's bedroom under the stars.

Often during the night, as is my wont, I awoke to glance

and

around, every time I did so I saw a watchful figure sitting near, or standing looking out across the plain beyond the trees. It was only later on that I found out the reason for this vigil.

Early in the morning I

shot my way back to the farm alone, for Hadj Ano laughingly declined to accompany me to see the Frenchmen. We parted with

a cheery hand-wave, meaning soon to meet again; but we have never met.

A few months after this I chanced to read 'La Dépêche Tunisienne,' and came across a column describing how the police had made a raid on Brown's farm with the object of capturing 'the renowned convict Hadj Ano.' My friend, it appeared, had been a chief of high standing in Algeria, where, in accordance with a tribal custom, he had worked off an old family blood-feud with a neighbouring tribe, and, after a well-fought single combat, had slain his man. But he had forgotten that Algeria was now a civilised country-a part of France in fact and the result was that

The coroner he came, and the justice too,
With a hue and a cry and a hullaballoo,

and poor Hadj Ano was sent across the seas to expiate his crime on board the hulks in New Caledonia.

By some means he ultimately effected his escape and returned to his people; but, finding Algeria too dangerous to live in, in safety, with a few trusted followers he moved across the mountains into Tunisia. Here he made the acquaintance of Brown, and his sportsmanlike and gentlemanly character, combined with his intelligence and education, made him at once a useful bailiff and a pleasant companion on the farm. His faithful people watched over and guarded him, and the country Arabs for miles round knew his story and passed him warning when French officials of any kind were moving in the direction of Brown's farm. At length fate went against him. Somehow, whether by bribery or other means I have never heard, the police managed to keep their movements secret, and having surrounded the farm during the night, seized poor Hadj Ano at the dawn of day, and took him back to prison.

What was his subsequent fate I have never heard.

FOUR years ago, when a handful of enthusiasts inaugurated a game of baseball in Battersea Park, they were warned off the ground by a policeman who scented danger to life and limb. Argument availed nothing, and six Americans who desired to play their national sport had to seek another location where rules and regulations were capable of being stretched by more tolerant officers of the law. Clapham Common was selected for a renewal of the experiment, and there they were allowed to pursue the tenor of their ways. The authorities who permitted the innovation were rewarded by the fact that the records of the season contained no account of broken bones, and the local coroner held no inquiry into loss of life on the diamond field. To that extent the baseballers had vindicated the character of their game, and their immunity from injury had led to a little admiration, besides winning a few converts. At first the cricketers and other sportsmen on the common had been distinctly disdainful, not to say contemptuous. The cheering, when there was any, was sarcastic and derisive; for the Clapham folk felt that they had progressed beyond rounders, and somewhat resented a fantastic display of the schoolboy recreation by able-bodied men. At the first blush this attitude was somewhat reasonable, for six men were not able to do proper justice to baseball, and the complex points of the game suffered in consequence. Gradually, however, persuasion induced several recruits to try their 'prentice hands, and then the common became more lively. One or two matches, played by nearly a full complement of men, attracted quiet attention, and the afternoon audiences grew larger every day. With numbers came interest,