If I had had the news to tell you that I now have, I should not have let you keep me out, even if you had forced me to break my way in.
Chum, the nicest girl in the world has told me that she loves me, and we are both as happy as happy can be, I know you will not be in a moment's doubt as to who she is, I have only run down here to break it to my family, and shall go back to the Shrubberies early next week--to talk to Mr.Pierce, you understand! My governor has decided that a couple of years' travel will keep me out of mischief as well as anything else he can devise, and as the prospect is not unpleasant, I am not going to let my new plans interfere with it, merely making my journeyings a _solitude a deux_, instead of solus.

So we shall be married in September, at the Shrubberies, and sail for Europe almost immediately.
Now, I want you to stand by me in this, as you have in other things, and help me through.

I want you, in short, to be my "best man" as you have been my Best friend.

"Best man," I should inform you, is an English wedding institution, which our swell people have suddenly discovered is a necessity to make a marriage ceremony legal.

He doesn't do much.