AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL ODDS & ENDS 55 



who fall on their feet, began to talk to a trainer 

 who took us to where we saw the race splen- 

 didly. 



Now, the only English race which I see and 

 never miss is the National. 



When the South African War was on I spent a 

 great deal of time at the War Office worrying 

 friends there for news. 



I remember so well one very high official reading 

 over some papers with bitter resignation and 

 looking across at me with a dry smile as he said, 

 " Diogenes might search this place with an electric 

 light for an honest man and not find him." 



We are taking this really great war without the 

 hysterical gloom that London plunged into then. 

 After Colenso it was unsafe even to talk to a bus 

 conductor without the fear of having to offer him 

 a pocket-handkerchief so as to weep decorously. 

 Two broke down over it to me one day. 



The most awe-stricken bus conductor I ever 

 encountered was on my way to Liverpool Street 

 when the bicycling craze was at its height. He 

 was shivering and incoherent, so much so that I 

 asked him if he was ill. 



" No, laidy, but we've just taken off a woman's 

 head." 



A girl of only twenty, her bicycle had side- 

 slipped and thrown her out under the wheels. 



I was in England all the Coronation summer 

 when it took about an hour sometimes to get down 



