"He's about the best hand at it that I know," said Sir Raffle, one day, to the secretary; "otherwise you may be sure I shouldn't keep him there." "I will allow that he is clever," said the secretary.

"It isn't cleverness, so much as tact.

It's what I call tact.

I hadn't been long in the service before I mastered it myself; and now that I've been at the trouble to teach him I don't want to have the trouble to teach another.

But upon my word he must mind his _p_'s and _q_'s; upon my word he must; and you had better tell him so." "The fact is, Mr.Kissing," said the private secretary the next day to the secretary,--Mr.Kissing was at that time secretary to the board of commissioners for the receipt of income tax--"The fact is, Mr.Kissing, Sir Raffle should never attempt to write a letter himself.