SUNDAY BRIDGE 241 



Gourmands were more physically repulsive than 

 the Territorials, and we finally were compelled 

 to decide the question (in accordance with 

 Rule IV.) by adding up the ages of the indi- 

 viduals in both photographs. It was then found 

 that the dinner group represented some 30,000 

 years, and beat the soldiers by about five cen- 

 turies. Our opponents eventually won five 

 tricks in Damsels, totalling thirty, which gave 

 them the game. 



5. 



It was now my turn to deal, and after glancing 

 through my hand I unhesitatingly declared No 

 Frumps. This I could well afiord to do, as I 

 had three aces (a portrait of the first Lord 

 Porpentine at the age of ninety-eight, on the 

 Woolsack; a reproduction of Mr. Sargent's 

 " Methuselah " from the Boston Public Library 

 fresco; and a group of Crimean Veterans photo- 

 graphed in their customary workhouse garb). 

 I also had a long suit in Babes, with three 

 Honours (all quite nude), and a guarded Queen 

 of Damsels (Lady Porpentine' s sister, a singu- 

 larly plain woman who devoted her life to good 

 works and was known to the suburban poor as 

 the Terror of Tooting: the photograph showed 

 her in convict's dress on her release from prison 

 two days after she had been sentenced to five 



16 



