_Those Romping Elfin Twenties_ It has been my personal observation, viewing the matter at close range, that nearly always fat, like old age or a thief in the dark, steals upon one unawares.

I take my own case.

As a youngster and on through my teens and into my early twenties--ah, those romping elfin twenties!--I was, in outline, what might be termed dwindly, not to say slimmish.

Those who have known me in my latter years might be loath to believe it, but one of my boyhood nick-names--I had several, and none of them was complimentary but all of them were graphic--was Bonesy.

At sixteen, by striping myself in alternate whites and blacks, I could have hired out for a surveyor's rod.
At twenty-one I measured six feet the long way, and if only mine had been a hook nose I should have cast a shadow like a shepherd's crook.
My avocation in life was such as to induce slenderness.