HENRY the garden gnome is safely back home after being snatched by a gang of jet-setting gnomenappers.

But there is still no clue as to who grabbed him from the doorstep of a County Durham pub. Since the gnomenap five months ago, Henry has travelled far and wide. But he still managed to send a cluster of postcards back to Shirley Craig, landlady of the Tanners Arms in Crook.

She said: "I was gobsmacked when Henry just turned up at a charity barbecue we were staging. A taxi pulled up and the driver handed me a big box."

Inside was Henry, plus a bride he had acquired on his travels, and four baby gnomes.

A note attached to Henry read: 'So glad to be gnome. I have come back with my wife Helga, who has had a sex change, and our four children. There's no place like gnome."

Shirley said: "It's so good to have him back, but we still have no clue as to who's been responsible for all this. It must be more than one person, because of the postcards we have had from different parts of the world."

One card from Germany read: "Was planning on coming gnome, but got diverted to Munich."

One from Zimbawe read: "Just gnomeing about in this hot climate."

Another, from the Millennium Dome in London, read: "The gnome at the dome is the gnome zone."

And one from Santorini, in the Greek islands, read: "Back gnome after another roam. Still gnomesick."

Shirley said: "It's been a lot of fun. I must have heard every gnome joke that's around. I'm dying to find out who was behind it all. But the last gnome laugh could be on them."

The latest roaming gnome saga comes just months after the conclusion of a similar mystery.

Last October, Peter the prodigal gnome returned home - also with a female companion - after a five-week globe-trotting trip.

He reappeared in the Colburn, North Yorkshire, garden of pensioners Sam and Sylvia Samways just as mysteriously as he had gone missing.