her gossiping would drown.

Happy monks of La Trappe! One has heard the foolish chattering world take
pity upon you. An hour of talk to a year of silence! O heavenly
proportion! And I can well imagine that when that hour has come, it seems
but a trivial toy you have forgotten how to play with. Were I a Trappist,
I would use my hour to evangelise converts to silence, would break the
long year's quiet but to whisper, 'How good is silence!' Let us inaugurate
a secular La Trappe, let us plot a conspiracy of silence, let us send the
world to Coventry. Or, if we must talk, let it be in Latin, or in the
'Volapük' of myriad-meaning music; and let no man joke save in Greek--that
all may laugh. But, best of all, let us leave off talking altogether, and
listen to the morning stars.




LIFE IN INVERTED COMMAS


As I waited for an omnibus at the corner of Fleet Street the other day, I
was the spectator of a curious occurrence. Suddenly there was a scuffle
hard by me, and, turning round, I saw a powerful gentlemanly man wrestling
with two others in livery, who were evidently intent on arresting him.
These men, I at once perceived, belonged to the detective force of the
Incorporated Society of Authors, and were engaged in the capture of a
notorious plagiarist. I knew the prisoner well. He had, in fact, pillaged
from my own writings; but I was none the less sorry for his plight, to
which, I would assure the reader, I was no party. Yet he was, I admit, an
egregiously bad case, and my pity is doubtless misplaced sentiment. Like