Kidd, "and thoroughly appreciated the fact that he was not beautiful;
when he was about 14 he said at dinner one day: 'I think I shall
marry X (a very plain cousin); between us we might produce the
missing link.' Aunt Marie was shocked!"

Many of the games arise from the skill in drawing of both Gilbert and
his father. A long history of two of the Masters drawn by Gilbert
shows them in the Salvation Army, as Christy Minstrels, as editors of
a new revolutionary paper, "La Guillotine," as besieged in their
office by a mob headed by Lord Salisbury, the Archbishop of
Canterbury and other Conservative leaders. Getting tired at last of
the adventures of these two mild scholars, Gilbert starts a series of
Shakespeare plays drawn in modern dress.

Shylock as an aged Hebrew vendor of dilapidated vesture, with a
tiara of hats, Antonio as an opulent and respectable city-merchant,
Bassanio as a fashionable swell and Gratiano as his loud and
disreputable "pal" with large checks and a billy-cock hat. Portia was
attired as a barrister in wig and gown and Nerissa as a clerk with a
green bag and a pen behind his ear. This being much appreciated, Your
Humble Servant questions what portion of the Bard of Avon he shall
next burlesque.

The little group seems certainly at this date to be living in a land
in which 'tis always afternoon. In one house or another tea-time
goes on until signs of dinner make their appearance. The boys only
move from one hospitable dining-room to another, or adjourn to their
own bedrooms where Gilbert piles book on book and reduces even neat
shelves to the same chaos that reigns in his own room.