Jacqueline Grant, the toast of every soldier, was to be your great love, was she not? And, next day, the saddler's window-dresser was to be the next lady of the manor! It will not do, Gussie! By all means enjoy such heroines for what they are but put aside these foolish romantick notions. I know too well what pleasures may be indulged with such specimens of my own sex. In the arbours of Lesbos I have tasted them often. But shopgirls and trollops are not to be the objects of such feelings as you cherish for Julie. And there let it end. Really, my dear! I was about to write to you of the delights of Lago di Garda when your letter came. I am so put out that my account must wait until after lunch. Till then, I am Your own loving Maude Anonymous Augustus and Lady Maude III. Lady Maude to Augustus Lago di Garda, 5 June p.m. My dear Augustus, Having disposed of the disagreeable matter of that little “tart" Julie this morning-the letter went by the Desenzano steamer just before lunch-I now settle down to write of pleasanter things. I shall have some fun here with the golden-skinned cat-eyed Miss Jones whom Mr. Bowler has brought to guard his fashion salon, and with the Scandinavian nymph Marit, on whom the said Jones is told to “keep an eye.” More of Marit and Miss Jones in a moment-the naked truth, dear Gussie. But first a word about this most drowsy summer lake. “Airs, languid airs, abound.” You should have come with us, you know. We have no neurasthenia here. I write this while sitting in the shade of the pergola, which is quite overgrown with purple wisteria. It forms a walk along the edge of the gardens furthest from the terrace of the Villa Lola. Small wonder if half the royalty and nobility of Europe seems to fill Gardone this season. From where I sit, one has an Olympian view ten miles across smooth water to the lemon groves above little Malcesine. To the south, through a pale mist of heat, one sees the flat Lombardy plain, running east to Verona and Venice.