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I have no information to add, but my own personal ramblings. I agree with everyone who has made the link with Josephine's death. It also seems clear that the house is a slightly altered Batemans see the bit in Something of Myself which describes the 'feng shui' of the house as being good: very similar to the passage from 'They' in last week's quotations. But I don't think the actual origin of the Egg illustration is important - to pin it down might even be counter-productive. To me what that passage, and in fact much of the story, is doing, is exploring how you find and identify those who understand. The story gains strength from the fact that the narrator understands emotionally, because of his own bereavement, but does not understand quite what is going on, in the way that those familiar with the house do. So they think he understands fully when in fact he does not yet. Time and time again in Kipling stories we are presented with a shibboleth something said, or the way it is said, which identifies the speaker as 'one of us', or 'someone who understands'. There are lots of examples, but the only one in other stories that I can think of right now is in 'In the Same Boat' where various small neurotic habits show the two protagonists that they are indeed 'in the same boat'. 'They' is full of them. The Egg passage is proof to both the blind lady and the narrator that the other understands, in an area that has nothing directly to do with the children, or at least not for him. For her it has, as she makes clear when she says 'Now I am sure you will never laugh at me, . . . nor at them.' His reaction, that 'a man who laughs at a child . . . is a heathen' gives her a shock in that it shows her that in spite of understanding, he still doesn't understand. But to my mind the important phrase in the whole exchange comes earlier, when he asks, 'But how in the world do you know about colours?'. Its importance is underlined in that the blind woman has to check that he means that question in the right way, not just in relation to her blindness. It seems to me that in a great deal of his writing, Kipling is offering us tiny glimpses of his inner world, looking for the person who will ask not 'What do you mean?', but 'How did you know?'. So 'They' is doing two things: it is certainly a half-opening of RK's heart in a way which he doesn't often do, but it is also an illustration of what he wants from those who understand, how important they are to him, and how painful is the presence of those, like Turpin, who don't understand. There are places elsewhere in Kipling which hit me so hard with their 'rightness' that I do find myself asking 'But how did you know?' Which is one reason why I find it painful to admit that I don't understand the ending of 'They', where the narrator decides it would be wrong to come again. In terms of RK's own life I can see why, but in the context of the story why not? Liz Breuilly %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%