my

   soldier will be like. I think I should like him to have a moustache—yes, I'm sure I want him to have a moustache."

   "He'll have a moustache all right," said Helen, who is practical rather than dreamy. "And he'll have whiskers, too, and a beard as long as your arm. Do you think people have time to shave when they're in trenches?"

   "Well, anyhow," said Rosie, "both our soldiers will be very brave men."

   "That," said Helen, "is quite certain. Let's put in some good hard stitches to thank them for their bravery."

   There was a short silence while this operation was performed with great zeal. The fingers flew through their complicated task and the web seemed to grow visibly.

   "Haven't you both," I said, "done about enough? Talk about mufflers! In my day a muffler was something a man wore round his neck; but your mufflers would serve to clothe a whole platoon from head to heel with something left over. Benevolence is all very well, but you shouldn't overdo it. There isn't a soldier alive who wouldn't trip over your mufflers. Think of him tripped up by a muffler and caught by a German."

   "Lady

    French

   ," said Helen, "wrote in her letter to

    The Times

   that every muffler was to be two yards and a half long and twelve inches broad."

   "Well," I said, "you've got the breadth all right."

   "Yes," said Helen, "we got that in the first line, and we've never let go of it since. Anybody could get the breadth.

    You

   could do that if you tried."

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