of the Royal Horse Guards (the Blues) is as usual one of the most interesting features of the entertainment. Every year I marvel more at the perfect training of both horses and men. It is worth going to the tournament to see this one item of the programme alone, but the cycling display by a detachment of the 26th Middlesex R. V. is novel and very interesting, showing how useful cyclists. may be, especially in reconnoitring. The Navy is well represented, the display given by the seamen of H.M.S. Exzellent is most—I was going to say excellent, but it might sound like a pun—at any rate it is very good. The final display, which might by Some be termed theatrical, as it entails a certain amount, of dressing up, is a representation of the '"Capture of Benin City," one of our latest military achievements. The outskirts of the town are depicted and we are introduced to the King, with his mace bearer and other attendants. He is seated on a stool in the centre of an evidently august assembly. Some captured carriers are just being brought in before him, the executioner 1 about to behead them with a sacrificial sword (a genuine one brought over from the seat of war), when firing is heard and our troops come up—the Benins fly into the town, a fight bossed leather work sent from Leighton Buzzard. It is mostly done by cripples and is really wonderful.
The processes of weaving and bookbinding are also shown and attracted much attention. Iwas much interested in the exhibits from the Soho Club and Home for Working Girls, principally tailoresses. Some of the work they have sent is beautiful, and quite remarkable when one considers that it is all done in the evenings after a hard day's employment. I had a long chat with Miss Stanley (the Hon. Sec.) and have promised to Visit the Club one evening soon, as I think an account of the good work being carried on there will prove most interesting.
Itisimpossible togive detailed account of the exhibits, which comprise 30 sections and come from all parts of the United Kingdom. Fourteen years the associa tion started with 40 classes in various centres, and they now number more than 500. Through its aid girls and boys have their idle hours filled up ata time of life when they most need a little outside guidance. Cripples and other invalids, whose lives were formerly a burden, are taught to work and are often enabled entirely to support themselves, and it is hoped that the tone of the working classes of the next generation may be materially influenced through the agency of this most excellent society.
20th May.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.