MR. SPARKER’S ADVENTUREWhen Mr. Alf Sparker boarded the last train from Spurn Cove to London, he was in the gayest of humors. He had obtained tremendous orders from the two leading drapers in the town for the goods of his firm—Silkerino Hosiery and Underwear, Limited—and on the strength of this achievement had won for his future partner in life, a certain Miss Maudie Griggs, in Mr. Sparker’s eyes the personification of all female perfections, and in point of fact a very desirable young woman indeed. Settling down in a corner seat of the railway carriage, with a case of samples on the luggage rack before him, and the memory of his lady’s kisses still warm on his lips, Mr. Sparker felt his bosom seething with emotions which a Keats would have transmuted into a joy forever, but which Mr. Spar
