A little parapet ran all the way around the square roof, and Pantalaimon often draped his pine-marten form over the mock-battlements on the corner facing south, and dozed while Lyra sat below with her back against the sun-drenched stone, studying the books she'd brought up with her.

This character has his own way of viewing all that is wrong, challenging nostalgic rhetoric and the most anachronistic Kiplingism.

The press here today proclaimed that Leaping Lena, a Natal Province frog, had beaten the Americans and broken the world's frog-jumping record at the Frog Olympics at Capetown.

Another Wilkinson attempt was charged down before a fine clearing run and kick from Ashton and burgled Scottish line-out worked a penalty chance from wide left.