Show KITCHENER AS A PET ROLE WOULD COME AS SURPRISE TO HIS subordinates nevertheless nevertheless graphic picture has ha been drawn of his friendship with two elderly ladles ladies unique use of gift gif many ot of i hest est friends of 0 lord kitchener the ae ecat cat english soldier administrator and secretary of war are women despite the popular belief that he is a grimly uncompromising woman hater in a recent brief biography of K of K harold begbie draws a most winning picture of his friendship with two of his bis elderly relatives two dear diminutive old Scotch lidies ladies who lived in gardens gar deus kensington by name of the misses aliases and kitchener was no dearer to these charming spinsters spin than they to him he wrote to them brightly and boyishly by almost every mail before lie he went to egypt for his advance on khartum khartun Khar tum these dear old ladies presented him with a gold headed swagger cane and when the advance was accomplished and the photographer arrived to make a picture of the general and his staff kitchener seated himself in the center of the group with this stick held so ostentatiously that the old ladies in kensington could not tail fail to recognize it when the photograph appeared in the illustrated papers he sent tho tham m roses from gordons grave at khartum khartun Khar tum and coats of the caliph from froin the sudan their house was always his goal on his return from distant service and in it he be was like a schoolboy running up the stairs two at a time whistling in his bedroom going and coming as he pleased and telling them such stories of his campaigns as no one else in london ever heard they called him herbert pronouncing it hair burrt in the broadest scotch and would sit on either side of him studying his bronzed face with their small smiling shrewd eyes teasing him chaffing him adoring him and giving him sound bound advice later on in his triumphal career their once wished to make the little old ladles ladies a gift so valuable and unusual that they felt called upon to pause and consider before accepting it it was a gold fosket cas one of the many gold caskets presented to IL of K by the grateful corporations of provincial cities do wo we need it propounded the tb first old lady pointedly no we certainly dont need it reflectively acquiesced her sister what could we do with it pursued the first farat old lady but the second had had time to think hum she suggested contemplatively perhaps we could use it as a tea caddy youths companion |