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+The Project Gutenberg eBook, Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 152, May
+23, 1917, by Various, Edited by Owen Seaman
+
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+
+
+
+Title: Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 152, May 23, 1917
+
+
+Author: Various
+
+Release Date: March 31, 2005  [eBook #15512]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+
+***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI,
+VOL. 152, MAY 23, 1917***
+
+
+E-text prepared by Jonathan Ingram, Sandra Brown, and the Project
+Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team
+
+
+
+Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this
+      file which includes the original illustrations.
+      See 15512-h.htm or 15512-h.zip:
+      (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/5/5/1/15512/15512-h/15512-h.htm)
+      or
+      (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/5/5/1/15512/15512-h.zip)
+
+
+
+
+
+PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI
+
+VOL. 152
+
+MAY 23, 1917
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+CHARIVARIA.
+
+MR. WILLIAM WATSON describes his new book of verse, _The Man Who Saw_,
+as "an intermittent commentary on the main developments and some of
+the collateral phenomena of the War." People are already asking, "Why
+was a man like this left out of the Dardanelles Commission?"
+
+       ***
+
+Weeds are a source of great trouble to the amateur gardener, says a
+contemporary, because he is not always able to recognise them. A good
+plan is to pull them out of the ground. If they come up again they are
+weeds.
+
+       ***
+
+We hope that Mr. CHARLES COCHRAN is not indisposed, but we have not
+noticed a new revue by him this week.
+
+       ***
+
+Sulphur from Italy is being distributed by the Explosives Committee.
+This body must not be confused with the Expletives Committee, which
+gets it supply of sulphur straight from the Front.
+
+       ***
+
+The Metropolitan Water Board is appealing against waste of water. It
+is proposed to provide patriotic householders with attractive cards
+stating that the owner of the premises in which the card is displayed
+is bound in honour not to touch the stuff.
+
+       ***
+
+According to a member of the Inventions Board, over two thousand
+solutions of the U-boat problem have already been received.
+Unfortunately this is more than the number of U-boats available for
+experiment, but it is hoped that by strictly limiting the allowance to
+one submarine per invention the question may be determined in a manner
+satisfactory to the greatest possible number.
+
+       ***
+
+Of eight applications received by the Barnes Council for the vacancy
+of Inspector of Nuisances three came from men of military age. It is
+expected that the Council will suggest that these gentlemen should be
+invited to inspect the nuisances in front of the British trenches.
+
+       ***
+
+The proprietor of thirteen steam rollers told the Egham Tribunal that
+in two years he had only been able to take one of them out of the
+yard. We cannot think that he has really tried. Much might have been
+done with kindness and a piece of cheese, while we have often seen
+quite large steam rollers being enticed along the road by a man with a
+red flag.
+
+       ***
+
+A Swiss correspondent is informed that "Hindenburg's legs are no
+longer strong enough to support him." The weakness appears to be
+gradually extending to his arms.
+
+       ***
+
+"The starched collar must go," remarks a contemporary ruefully.
+Not, we hope, before a substitute has been found for some of those
+unwashable necks.
+
+       ***
+
+"Lady conductors," said the Underground Railway official last week,
+"must remember that the seats and straps are put there for the use of
+the passengers." We know all about straps, but we have often wondered
+what it feels like to use one of the seats on the Underground.
+
+       ***
+
+The police have raided a coining plant in Marylebone. It is becoming
+more and more difficult to make money.
+
+       ***
+
+Under a recent Government order the importation of wild animals into
+Great Britain is forbidden. Allotment holders throughout the country
+hope the order will be read out to any wireworm or potato-moth that
+attempts to land at our ports.
+
+       ***
+
+A deputation to the FOOD CONTROLLER has demanded that the allowance of
+bread to farm labourers should be increased to two pounds per head per
+day. The amount is considered excessive in view of the national needs,
+and the alternative course of permitting them to eat all they can grow
+is being favourably considered.
+
+       ***
+
+Mr. MITCHEL, the Mayor of New York, has forbidden musicians to play
+the National Anthems of the Allies in ragtime. Mr. MITCHEL is a great
+humanitarian and simply hates the sound of anything in pain.
+
+       ***
+
+The German Society of Actors and Singers had forbidden its members
+to sing in the United States. Enthusiasts from the latter country
+are planning an early trip to Northern France rather than miss
+entertainment in the Siegfried and Wotan line.
+
+       ***
+
+Following so closely upon the report that a Wallasey woman had
+discovered a German coin in a loaf of bread we were not surprised by a
+contemporary headline, "Seymour Hicks in a new Rôle."
+
+       ***
+
+Damage to the extent of twenty-five thousand pounds is said to have
+been caused to the crops in Australia by mice, and the Australian
+authorities contemplate the purchase of a mouse trap.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+[Illustration: _Economist_ (_soliloquising_). "WE MUST ALL DENY
+OURSELVES SOMETHING. AND TO THINK, DESPITE THE PAPER SHORTAGE, PEOPLE
+ARE STILL SMOKING CIGARETTES."]
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    AN IRISH SETTLEMENT.
+
+    "Miss----, who elected to serve fourteen days' imprisonment
+    rather than pay a fine for an alleged assault arising out of
+    a little commotion in Cork, was, on her release from prison,
+    presented with a gold mounted umbrella in compensation for
+    the one she broke on a policeman's head."--_Evening Herald_
+    (_Dublin_).
+
+In view of the admission in the last sentence, "alleged" is good.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    "New York, Friday.--An elaborate programme of welcome will
+    be escorted to the City Hall, which has been prepared. The
+    British Mission has been strikingly decorated for the occasion
+    with innumerable British and Allied flags."--_Liverpool Post_.
+
+We are not anxiously awaiting a snapshot of Mr. BALFOUR in his latest
+costume.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    "The vessels are at present under construction by the Kawashi
+    Dockyard Company, Limited, of Kobe, and realised from £42 to
+    £42 per ton deadweight."--_Poverty Bay Herald_.
+
+A careful calculation will show that the average cost was almost
+exactly forty guineas.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    "Several rhubord recipes have come in this week, so that the
+    reader who esquired for recipe for rhubard jelly is supplied
+    with this, and recipes for other rhubarb dainties as
+    well."--_Edmonton Journal_ (_Canada_).
+
+If _John Gilpin_ were to "dine at Edmonton" (Canada) he would come in
+for some nice new vegetables.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+A PLACE OF ARMS.
+
+    [Inscribed by a humble member of the Inner Temple to the
+    Benchers of his Inn.]
+
+  I knew a garden green and fair,
+    Flanking our London river's tide,
+  And you would think, to breathe its air
+    And roam its virgin lawns beside,
+  All shimmering in their velvet fleece,
+  "Nothing can hurt this haunt of Peace."
+
+  No trespass marred that close retreat;
+    Privileged were the few that went
+  Pacing its walks with measured beat
+    On legal contemplation bent;
+  And Inner Templars used to say:
+  "How well our garden looks today!"
+
+  But That which changes all has changed
+    This guarded pleasaunce, green and fair,
+  And soldier-ranks therein have ranged
+    And trod its beauty hard and bare,
+  Have tramped and tramped its fretted floor
+  Learning the discipline of War.
+
+  And many a moon of Peace shall climb
+     Above that mimic Field of Mars
+  Before the healing touch of Time
+     With springing green shall hide its scars;
+  But Inner Templars smile and say:
+  "Our barrack-square looks well today."
+
+  Good was that garden in their eyes,
+     Lovely its spell of long-ago;
+  Now waste and mired its glory lies,
+     And yet they hold it dearer so,
+  Who see beneath the wounds it bears
+  A grace no other garden wears.
+
+  For still the memory, never sere,
+     But fresh as after fallen rain,
+  Of those who learned their lesson here
+     And may not ever come again,
+  Gives to this garden, bruised and browned,
+  A greenness as of hallowed ground.
+
+O.S.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+RANDOM FLIGHTS.
+
+BY MARCUS MACLEOD.
+
+(_With renewed acknowledgments to "The Skittish Weekly."_)
+
+It was with inexpressible relief that I heard of the narrow escape
+of the Rev. Urijah Basham. Presiding at a jumble sale at Sidcup he
+described how he had been within an ace of partaking of rhubarb leaves
+at luncheon on the previous day, but, having read in the morning's
+paper of their fatal results, wisely decided to abstain. I need hardly
+remind my readers that Mr. Basham is, after the Rev. JOSEPH HOCKING,
+perhaps our greatest preacher-novelist. The jumble sale was held in
+the beautiful concert hall of the Sidcup Temperance Congregational
+Reed Band. The Dowager-Lady Bowler, Sir Moses Pimblett, and the Rev.
+Chadley Bandman were amongst those who graced the function with their
+presence.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+A correspondent has kindly sent me a copy of _The Little Diddlington
+Parish Magazine_ for April. In it there is an interesting letter
+claiming that the original of _Mr. Pickwick_ was a benevolent
+gentleman named Swizzle, who was temporarily employed as perpetual
+curate of Little Diddlington in the sixties. The evidence on which
+this identification is founded seems to me somewhat unconvincing, as
+_Pickwick_ was published in the year 1836. But Nature, as it has
+been finely said, often borrows from Art, and Fact may similarly be
+inspired to emulate Fiction.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+I promised not to trouble my readers again with the Mystery of the Man
+in the Iron Mask. But I may be allowed merely to mention that there
+is an excellent study of the subject in _The Methodist Monthly_, by
+my old friend, Professor Corker. The article, which runs to nearly
+seventy pages, does the utmost credit to this brilliant writer, who
+comes to the conclusion that no satisfactory solution of the mystery
+has ever been propounded or ever can be. But while his examination of
+the different theories is singularly free from bias he is evidently
+impressed by the ingenious view of Dr. Amos Stoot, the eminent Chicago
+alienist, that the masked inmate of the Bastille immured himself
+voluntarily in order to investigate the conditions of French prison
+life at the time, but, owing to the homicidal development of
+his subliminal consciousness, was detained indefinitely by the
+authorities, and during his imprisonment wrote the _Letters of
+Junius_.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+I have been reading with much enjoyment, and I hope profit, a
+book entitled _Behind the Ivory Gate; Being the Reminiscences of a
+Dentist_, by Orlando Pullar, F.R.D.S. Mr. Pullar's opportunities for
+studying the psychology of his clients have been exceptional, and he
+has turned them to rich account in these fascinating pages. He is,
+moreover, as adroit with his pen as with the instruments of his humane
+and benevolent calling, and has a pretty wit. Thus he tells us that
+his villa at Balham is named "Tusculum," and that, in view of the fact
+that three generations of Pullars have been dentists, his family can
+be said to be of "old extraction." This pleasant quip I seem to have
+heard before; but, with all deductions, there are many signs here of
+a strong sagacious mind, that brings to bear on all the jars of daily
+life the priceless emollient of moral uplift.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+[Illustration: THE HYPNOTIST.
+
+BETHMANN-HOLLWEG: "KEEP LOOKING AT ME. YOU'RE WINNING THE WAR! YOU'RE
+WINNING THE WAR! YOU'RE WINNING THE WAR!"]
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+THE MUD LARKS.
+
+Never have I seen a kiltie platoon wading through the cold porridge
+of snow and slush of which our front used to be composed, but I have
+said, with my French friend, "_Mon Dieu, les currents d'air!_" and
+thank Fate that I belong to a race which reserves its national costume
+for fancy-dress balls.
+
+It is very well for MacAlpine of Ben Lomond, who has stalked his
+haggis and devoured it raw, who beds down on thistles for preference
+and grows his own fur; but it is very hard on Smith of Peckham, who
+through no fault of his own finds himself in a Highland regiment,
+trying to make his shirt-tails do where his trousers did before. But
+the real heather-mixture, double-distilled Scot is a hardy bird with
+different ideas from _nous autres_ as to what is cold: also as to what
+is hot. Witness the trying experience of our Albert Edward.
+
+Our Albert Edward and a Hun rifle grenade arrived at the same place at
+the same time, intermingled and went down to the Base to be sifted. In
+the course of time came a wire from our Albert Edward, saying he
+had got the grenade out of his system and was at that moment at the
+railhead; were we going to send him a horse or weren't we?
+
+Emma was detailed for the job, which was a mistake, because Emma was
+not the mount for a man who had been softening for five months in
+hospital. She had only two speeds in her repertoire, a walk which
+slung you up and down her back from her ears to her croup, and a trot
+which jarred your teeth loose and rattled the buttons off your tunic.
+However, she went to the railhead and Albert Edward mounted her, threw
+the clutch into the first speed and hammered out the ten miles to our
+camp, arriving smothered in snow and so stiff we had to lift him down,
+so raw it was a mockery to offer him a chair, and therefore he had to
+take his tea off the mantelpiece.
+
+We advised a visit to Sandy. Sandy was the hot bath merchant. He
+lurked in a dark barn at the end of the village, and could be found
+there at anytime of any day, brooding over the black cauldrons in
+which the baths were brewed, his Tam-o'-shanter drooped over one eye,
+steam condensing on his blue nose. Theoretically the hot baths were
+free, but in practice a franc pressed into Sandy's forepaw was found
+to have a strong calorific effect on the water.
+
+So down the village on all fours, groaning like a Dutch brig in a
+cross-sea, went our Albert Edward. He crawled into the dark barn and,
+having no smaller change, contributed a two-franc bill to the forepaw
+and told Sandy about his awful stiffness. His eloquence and the double
+fee broke Sandy's heart. With great tears in his eyes he assured
+Albert Edward that the utmost resources of his experience and
+establishment should be mobilised on his (Albert Edward's) behalf, and
+ushered him tenderly into that hidden chamber, constructed of sacking
+screens, which was reserved for officers. Albert Edward peeled his
+clothes gingerly from him, and Sandy returned to his cauldrons.
+
+The peeling complete, Albert Edward sat in the draughts of the inner
+chamber and waited for the bath. The outer chamber was filled with
+smoke, and the flames were leaping six feet above the cauldrons; but
+every time Albert Edward holloaed for his bath Sandy implored another
+minute's grace.
+
+Finally Albert Edward could stand the draughts no longer and ordered
+Sandy, on pain of court-martial and death, to bring the water, hot or
+not.
+
+Whereupon Sandy reluctantly brought his buckets along, and, grumbling
+that neither his experience nor establishment had had a fair chance,
+emptied them into the tub. Albert Edward stepped in without further
+remark and sat down.
+
+The rest of the story I had from my groom and countryman, who, along
+with an odd hundred other people, happened to be patronising the outer
+chamber tubs at the time. He told me that suddenly they heard "a yowl
+like a man that's afther bein' bit be a mad dog," and over the screen
+of the inner chamber came our Albert Edward in his birthday dress.
+"Took it in his sthride, Sor, an' coursed three laps round the
+bath-house cursin' the way he'd wither the Divil," said my groom and
+countryman; "then he ran out of the door into the snow an' lay down in
+it." He likewise told me that Albert Edward's performance had caused a
+profound sensation among the other bathers, and they inquired of
+Sandy as to the cause thereof; but Sandy shook his Tam-o'-shanter and
+couldn't tell them; hadn't the vaguest idea. The water he had given
+Albert Edward was hardly scalding, he said; hardly scalding, with
+barely one packet of mustard dissolved in it.
+
+Our Albert Edward is still taking his meals off the mantelpiece.
+
+I met my friend, the French battery commander, yesterday. He was
+cantering a showy chestnut mare over the turf, humming a tune aloud.
+He looked very fit and very much in love with the world. I asked him
+what he meant by it. He replied that he couldn't help it; everybody
+was combining to make him happy; his C.O. had fallen down a gun-pit
+and broken a leg; he had won two hundred francs from his pet enemy; he
+had discovered a jewel of a cook; and then there was always the Boche,
+the perfectly priceless, absolutely ridiculous, screamingly funny
+little Boche. The Boche, properly exploited, was a veritable fount of
+joy. He dreaded the end of the War, he assured me, for a world without
+Boches would be a salad sans the dressing.
+
+I inquired as to how the arch-humourist had been excelling himself
+lately.
+
+The Captain passaged his chestnut alongside my bay, chuckled and told
+me all about it. It appeared that one wet night he was rung up by
+the Infantry to say that the neighbouring Hun was up to some funny
+business, and would he stand by for a barrage, please?
+
+What sort of funny business was the Hun putting up?
+
+Oh, a rocket had gone up over the way and they thought it was a signal
+for some frightfulness or other.
+
+He stood by for half an hour, and then, as nothing happened, turned
+in. Ten minutes later the Infantry rang up again. More funny business;
+three rockets had gone up.
+
+He stood by for an hour with no result, then sought his bunk once
+more, cursing all men. Confound the Infantry getting the jumps over
+a rocket or two! Confound them two times! Then a spark of inspiration
+glowed within him, glowed and flamed brightly. If his exalted _poilus_
+got the wind up over a handful of rockets, how much more also would
+the deteriorating Boche?
+
+Gurgling happily, he brushed the rats off his chest and the beetles
+off his face, turned over and went to sleep. Next morning he wrote
+a letter to his "god-mother" in Paris ("_une petite femme, très
+intelligente, vous savez_"), and ten days later her parcels came
+tumbling in. The first night (a Monday) he gave a modest display,
+red and white rockets bursting into green stars every five minutes.
+Tuesday night more rockets, with a few Catherine-wheels thrown in.
+Wednesday night, Catherine-wheels and golden rain, and so on until the
+end of the week, when they finished up with a grand special attraction
+and all-star programme, squibs, Catherine-wheels, Roman candles,
+Prince of Wales' feathers, terminating in a blinding, fizzing barrage
+of coloured rockets, and "God bless our Home" in golden stars.
+
+"All very pretty," said I, "but what were the results?"
+
+"Precisely what I anticipated. A deserter came over yesterday who was
+through it all and didn't intend to go through it again. They had got
+the wind up properly, he said, hadn't had a wink of sleep for a week.
+His officers had scratched themselves bald-headed trying to guess what
+it was all about. All ranks stood to continuously, up to their waists
+in mud, frozen stiff and half drowned, while _my_ brave little rogues
+of _poilus_, mark you, slept warm in their dug-outs, and the only man
+on duty was the lad who was touching the fireworks off. O friend of
+mine, there is much innocent fun to be got out of the Boche if you'll
+only give him a chance!"
+
+PATLANDER.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+[Illustration: _Verger_ (_to Mrs. Smith, about to wed for fourth
+time_). "VERY UNUSUAL INDEED, MRS. SMITH. I CAN'T REMEMBER ANY OF THE
+OTHER THREE BEING QUITE SO LATE AS THIS."]
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    "The position of men who were not 41 before June 24, 1917,
+    and who have since attained 41 is again the subject of much
+    confusion."--_Daily Dispatch_.
+
+We can well believe this.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+[Illustration: _Mollie_ (_who has been naughty and condemned to
+"no toast"_). "OH, MUMMY! ANYTHING BUT THAT! I'D RATHER HAVE A HARD
+SMACK--_ANYWHERE YOU LIKE_."]
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+A CURE FOR CURIOSITY.
+
+(_An Idealistic Fable_.)
+
+  Alfonso Ebenezer Scutt
+  Could never keep his mouth close shut;
+  And when I mention that his tongue
+  Was flexible and loosely hung,
+  You will begin to understand
+  Why he was honoured in our land.
+
+  A lucky _coup_ in mining shares
+  Released him from financial cares,
+  And though his wife was strangely plain--
+  A lady of Peruvian strain--
+  She had a handsome revenue
+  Derived from manganese and glue.
+  Thus fortified, in Nineteen-Six
+  Alfonso entered politics,
+  Ousting from Sludgeport-on-the-Ouse
+  A Tory of old-fashioned views.
+  Alfonso Scutt, though wont to preach
+  In chapels, rarely made a speech,
+  But managed very soon to climb
+  To eminence at Question Time.
+  Fired by insatiable thirst
+  For knowledge, from the very first
+  He launched upon an endless series
+  Of quite unnecessary queries,
+  Till overworked officials came
+  To loathe the mention of his name.
+  At last their anguish grew so keen
+  The Premier had to intervene,
+  And by a tactful master-stroke
+  Relieved them from Alfonso's yoke.
+  By way of liberal reward
+  He made the childless Scutt a lord,
+  And then despatched him on a Mission
+  In honorific recognition
+  Of presents sent for our relief
+  By a renowned New Guinea Chief.
+  The natives of those distant parts
+  Are noted for their generous hearts,
+  But, spite of protests raised by us,
+  Continue anthropophagous.
+  And this, I have no doubt, was why,
+  When Members wished Lord Scutt good-bye,
+  You could not see one humid eye.
+       *       *       *       *       *
+  The moral of this simple strain
+  I trust is adequately plain.
+  When people crave for information
+  Unfit, in war, for publication,
+  They take a line, from vice or levity,
+  That's not conducive to longevity.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+AN AFRICAN APPEAL.
+
+The Baboo must look to his laurels, for other dusky aspirants to
+fluent articulate culture are on the warpath, and they are by no means
+to be underrated. I have seen lately quite a number of letters from
+young studious gentlemen of Ashantee, who, having acquired a little
+English, desire more, and develop a passion for correspondence with
+English strangers, whose names they pick up. The following typical
+example, dated March 9th, 1917, will serve to illustrate the new
+habit:--
+
+    "DEAR SIR,--I am with much pleasure to indite you about your
+    name that has come to my hand with great, joy. On the receipt
+    of this letter, know that I want to be one of your fellow
+    friends. You have been reported to me by a friend of mine of
+    your good attention and benevolences. My openion of writing
+    you is to say, I want to take you as my favourite friend.
+    Everything or news that may be happened there at your side, I
+    wish you to report same to me. And I also shall report same
+    to you satisfaction. Will you be good enough to agree with
+    me? Then I hope to get few lines of news from you being as
+    you consented or disconsented. To have a friend at abroad is
+    something that delights the life. I am earnestly requested to
+    hear from you soon. I beg to detain, dear Sir,
+
+                       "Yrs truly,
+                            ----."
+
+To whom do you think that letter is addressed? You would suppose to
+some public personage with a reputation for cordial sympathy with the
+young and earnest, such as the CHIEF SCOUT, for instance. But no, the
+"Dear Sir" is in reality a limited liability company, one of whose
+circulars, I suppose, wandered to the Gold Coast.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+THE LAW COURTS THEATRE.
+
+"ROMNEY'S RUM 'UN."
+
+London was probably never richer in comic actors than at the present
+moment, for not only is W.H. BERRY at the Adelphi, LESLIE HENSON at
+the Gaiety, ARTHUR ROBERTS at the Oxford singing his old songs, and
+ROBERT HALE and GEORGE ROBEY twice daily elsewhere, but in the Law
+Courts Playhouse CHARLES DARLING has been lately at his very best.
+Dropping in there last week, during the performance of a new
+farce, entitled _Romney's Rum 'Un_, I was again fascinated by the
+inexhaustible wit and allusive badinage of this great little comedian,
+beside whose ready gagging GEORGE GRAVES himself is inarticulate. Had
+not GEORGE ROBEY invented for application to himself the descriptive
+phrase, "The Prime Minister of Mirth," it should be at once affixed to
+the Law Courts' fun-maker; but, since it is too late to use that, let
+us think of him as "The Chancellor of the Exchequer of Mirth."
+
+CHARLES DARLING'S success is the more remarkable because he keeps so
+still. He sits in his chair as steadily as another of his outdistanced
+rivals, SAM MAYO ("The Immobile Comedian," as he is called), remains
+standing. He has few gestures; he rarely, if ever, sings, and I have
+never seen him dance; and yet the way in which he "gets over" is
+astonishing. "Laughter holding both his sides" is the most constant
+attendant of this theatre.
+
+What is the secret? Well, first and foremost it is of course to be
+sought in the genius of the actor himself; but contributory causes are
+the acceptivity of the audience, which is more noticeable in the Law
+Courts than in any other London theatre, and the willingness of his
+fellow-performers to "feed" him, as stage-folk have it; that is to
+say, provide him with materials upon which (again resorting to stage
+language) he may "crack his wheezes." The other day, for example, that
+excellent comedian, JOHN SIMON, was his principal ally in this way,
+and nothing could have been better than the sympathy between the two
+funny men. To CHARLES DARLING naturally fell the fat of the dialogue,
+but no one enjoyed the treat more than JOHN SIMON, in whose dictionary
+the word jealousy does not exist. LESLIE SCOTT also did his best to
+"feed" his principal, and the results were a scream.
+
+If the jokes were now and then a little legal, what did it matter?
+Many of the audience were legal too, and that there is no better
+audience the reports of the farces played here day after day
+abundantly prove. They are out for fun, and therefore in an
+appreciative and complaisant mood.
+
+To prove a comedian's genius to the mere reader is a difficult
+matter, and one can never hope to re-embody him in all his humorous
+idiosyncracies; but quotation comes to one's aid, and in the case
+of such a wit as CHARLES DARLING it is invaluable. Thus JOHN SIMON,
+referring to Mrs. SIDDONS' unwieldiness in her old age, said that in
+a certain part she had to be helped from her knees by two attendants.
+Quick as lightning came the comment, "When she was younger she was
+able to rise on her own merits." Was ever so exquisitely funny and
+unexpected a turn given to the dull word "merits"? Another
+perfect thing from this diverting piece, followed also by Homeric
+cachinnations, was the mock-serious apophthegm: "If a cloud is going
+to support a lady of substantial proportions, you must make it fairly
+solid."
+
+I came away with reluctance, filled with wonder at the want of
+enterprise shown by our revue-managers in not having, long ere now,
+secured CHARLES DARLING'S services. If only he continues to take
+his art seriously he has a great future. Meanwhile I am applying
+embrocation to my sore sides.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+NATURE NOTES.
+
+    _"The Gloaming,"_
+
+    _North Kensington_.
+
+
+    DEAR MR. PUNCH,--I wonder if any of your intelligent readers
+    have noticed the wonderful adaptability of Nature, of which I
+    send you the following remarkable instance:--The yellowhammer,
+    which we are always told sings, "A little bit of bread and no
+    che-e-ese," has (unless my ears grossly deceive me) changed
+    its words this year to "A little bit of cheese and no
+    bre-e-ead!" Need I say more?
+
+    Your obedient servant, OBSERVATOR.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    "Mr. Isaac L.---- is in Cape Town. We hope the change will do
+    Mrs. L.---- good."--_Weekly Paper_.
+
+We trust that no domestic differences are indicated.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    "The bread ...had been collected from local hostels and
+    barracks for pigs."--_Daily Mail_.
+
+Does the writer delicately hesitate to call a sty a sty, or has the
+internment of the food-hog really begun?
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    "Lord Robert Cecil concluded: 'There is a well-known French
+    proverb, Que; messieurs, les assassins commencement--let the
+    murderers begin.'"--_Daily News_.
+
+Our contemporary has begun.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+REVENTLOW RUMINATES.
+
+  I have no wounds to show; the cannon's thunder
+    Does not impair my rest. It's just as well,
+  For, though I dote on blood, and thoughts of plunder
+    Act on my jaded spirit like a spell,
+  I could not but regard it as a blunder
+    If Prussia's foremost scribe should stop a shell.
+
+  So, while I sport the usual iron crosses,
+    No feats of valour pinned them on my breast,
+  But writing up the sanguinary losses
+    Inflicted by our genius in the West.
+  The punctual theme of my Imperial boss is
+    "Turn on a victory!" and I do the rest.
+
+  To praise each spasm of ruthlessness that passes
+    Down cringing HOLLWEG'S compromising spine,
+  Boost the pretensions of the ruling classes
+    And hail the Hohenzollerns as divine,
+  And never hesitate to tell the masses
+    They are and will continue to be swine:--
+
+  These are my task. And there are compensations
+    About the job that field-grey heroes lack.
+  Although, e.g., there is a dearth of rations,
+    I'm not the one that goes without his whack;
+  Nor do the bayonets of inferior nations
+    Send nervous chills down my retreating back.
+
+  Yet sometimes in the small and early watches
+    I think, "Good Lord! suppose the U-boats fail!
+  Or our Colossus of the purple blotches
+    Should let the Allies get him by the tail!
+  Suppose this war is one of Deutschland's botches,
+    And Right, not Might, should happen to prevail!"
+
+  There'd be a revolution; nought could stop it.
+    Not that I'd weep if WILHELM had to go;
+  But what if Holy Junkerdom should cop it?
+    That would be most unfortunate--and, oh!
+  Supposing Count REVENTLOW had to hop it,
+    Kultur would never rally from the blow.
+
+ALGOL.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+ROYAL ACADEMY DEPRESSIONS.--II.
+
+[Illustration: "COME ALONG, YOU LITTLE IMP! I'LL LEARN YOU TO MAKE FUN
+OF MY TROUSERS."]
+
+[Illustration: THE ETERNAL FEMININE.
+
+"THAT'LL DO; DON'T TROUBLE ABOUT YOUR HAIR--WE'RE NOT LIKELY TO MEET
+ANYONE."
+
+"OH, I CAN'T GO LIKE THIS; ONE NEVER KNOWS WHEN A SUBMARINE MAY BOB
+UP."]
+
+[Illustration: THE FOOD SHORTAGE. ARRIVAL OF THE MINT-SAUCE BOAT.]
+
+[Illustration: _Figure on the Seat._ "HE CALLS THIS 'THE GARDEN OF
+MEMORIES,' BUT HE NEARLY FORGOT _ME_."]
+
+[Illustration: UNHAPPY RESULT OF A TOO GENEROUS FRUIT DIET.]
+
+[Illustration: NATIONAL ECONOMY.
+
+"NOW THEN, MY LADS, KEEP YOUR HEADS DOWN OR WE'LL HAVE THE FRAME
+CONTROLLER AFTER US."]
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+[Illustration: _Second-Lieutenant Spooner_ (_unnerved by presence of
+a General inspecting_). "THE COMPANY WILL MOVE TO THE FIGHT IN ROARS.
+FORM--ROARS! FIGHT!"]
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+ZERO.
+
+("_Zero-hour_"--_commonly known as "Zero"_--_is the hour fixed for the
+opening of an Infantry attack._)
+
+  I woke at dawn and flung the window wide.
+    Behind the hedge the lazy river ran;
+  The dusky barges idled down the tide;
+    In the laburnum-tree the birds began;
+  And it was May and half the world in flower;
+    I saw the sun creep over an Eastward brow,
+  And thought, "It may be, this is Zero-hour;
+    Somewhere the lads are 'going over' now."
+
+  Somewhere the guns speak sudden on the height
+    And build for miles their battlement of fire;
+  Somewhere the men that shivered all the night
+    Peer anxious forth and scramble through the wire,
+  Swarm slowly out to where the Maxims bark,
+    And green and red the panic rockets rise;
+  And Hell is loosed, and shyly sings a lark,
+    And the red sun climbs sadly up the skies.
+
+  Now they have won some sepulchred Gavrelle,
+    Some shattered homes in their own dust concealed;
+  Now no Bosch troubles them nor any shell,
+    But almost quiet holds the thankful field,
+  While men draw breath, and down the Arras road
+    Come the slow mules with battle's dreary stores,
+  And there is time to see the wounded stowed,
+    And stretcher-squads besiege the doctors' doors.
+
+  Then belches Hell anew. And all day long
+    The afflicted place drifts heavenward in dust;
+  All day the shells shriek out their devils' song;
+   All day men cling close to the earth's charred crust;
+  Till, in the dusk, the Huns come on again,
+    And, like some sluice, the watchers up the hill
+  Let loose the guns and flood the soil with slain,
+    And they go back, but scourge the village still.
+
+  I see it all. I see the same brave souls
+    To-night, to-morrow, though the half be gone,
+  Deafened and dazed, and hunted from their holes,
+    Helpless and hunger-sick, but holding on.
+  I shall be happy all the long day here,
+    But not till night shall they go up the steep,
+  And, nervous now because the end is near,
+    Totter at last to quietness and to sleep.
+
+  And men who find it easier to forget,
+    In England here, among the daffodils,
+  That there in France are fields unflowered yet,
+    And murderous May-days on the unlovely hills--
+  Let them go walking where the land is fair
+    And watch the breaking of a morn in May,
+  And think, "It may be Zero over there,
+    But here is Peace"--and kneel awhile, and pray.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+    "Surely one result of the war will be that civilised races
+    will regard the German as an outcast unfit to associate with
+    or to have dealings with on equal terms. If he is able to
+    say 'tu grogue' we shall put ourselves in a false
+    position."--_Times of India_.
+
+For ourselves, we decline to do this. We shall simply call him
+another.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+[Illustration: FOR SERVICES RENDERED.
+
+A GERMAN DECORATION FOR BRITISH STRIKERS.]
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+ESSENCE OF PARLIAMENT.
+
+[Illustration: Our racing correspondent writes that Mr. LLOYD GEORGE
+is having some difficulty with his string (Sinn Fein's Beauty GINNELL,
+All and More for Ireland REDMOND, and Ulster CARSON) for the Irish
+Grand National.]
+
+
+_Monday, May 14th_.--No longer will the FIRST SEA LORD be distracted
+from his primary duty of strafing the Hun by the necessity of looking
+after supplies. That function will now be discharged by an hon. and
+temp. Vice-Admiral, in the person of Sir ERIC GEDDES, late hon. and
+temp. Major-General and Director of Transportation to the Army in
+France, and now Shipbuilder-in-Chief to the nation. Everyone
+seemed pleased, with the notable exception of Mr. HOGGE, who cannot
+understand why all these appointments should be showered upon Sir ERIC
+GEDDES, when there are other able Scotsmen still unemployed. A late
+hon. Admiral of the Fleet, now residing at Potsdam, is believed to
+share Mr. HOGGE'S objections.
+
+The hardships endured by the criminal classes when they are so
+unfortunate as to get into prison always strikes a sympathetic chord
+in the gentle breast of Mr. EDMUND HARVEY. His latest discovery is
+that they are allowed the use of writing-paper not more than once a
+month; and for the rest of the time have to entrust their literary
+compositions to the unsympathetic surface of a slate, with the aid of
+a probably squeaky slate-pencil. Could JOHN BUNYAN have written _The
+Pilgrim's Progress_ under such conditions? The question opens up
+a vista of speculation as to the influence of environment upon the
+creative faculty; and it is not surprising that Mr. BRACE was unable
+to answer it offhand.
+
+In ordinary times the Financial Secretary of the Treasury is the most
+important Member of the Government outside the Cabinet. Under the
+present _régime_ he is not a member of the House at all. It is true
+that Mr. BALDWIN takes his place as Parliamentary whipping-boy to the
+CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUER with much grace and good humour; but that
+does not satisfy hon. Members, who want a more substantial object for
+their daily castigation. The debate on this subject revealed a sharp
+division of opinion between Mr. EDWIN MONTAGU and Mr. HERBERT SAMUEL.
+COUSIN EDWIN, as an ex-Secretary of the Treasury, did not think
+the House had suffered any serious loss through being unable to
+cross-examine that official direct. COUSIN HERBERT was shocked at this
+revolutionary sentiment coming from his kinsman. If it were accepted
+there was no logical reason why even the Chancellor of the Exchequer
+should have a seat in the House. Why, indeed, have Ministers at all? A
+row of gramophones, ranged along the Treasury Bench and supplied with
+officially prepared records, would satisfy all legitimate curiosity.
+
+_Tuesday, May 15th_.--I forget how many weeks ago it is since Mr.
+BONAR LAW announced that the Government were going to make one more
+effort to settle the Irish Question, and that in due course the
+PRIME MINISTER would announce their proposals. Since then events have
+conspired to produce successive postponements. Mr. LLOYD GEORGE had to
+go to France--for the War refuses to stop even though Irishmen decline
+to encourage it--Mr. REDMOND fell ill, Archbishop WALSH indited a
+postscript, and an election in South Longford suggested doubts as to
+whether Nationalist M.P.'s were really the Irish nation after all.
+Nevertheless there is a plan; and it is to be communicated, but in the
+first instance to the leaders of Irish parties only, and then, if they
+please, to the Press, and finally, perhaps, to the House of Commons.
+
+_Wednesday, May 16th_.--We all want to help the new Russian Government
+in its difficult task, but I doubt if Mr. SNOWDEN and his pacifist
+friends have contributed to that end by inviting the House of Commons
+to endorse forthwith the "no annexation, no indemnities" declaration
+of a section of the Revolutionaries, and by supporting their proposal
+in a series of speeches which might be summed up in the words "Peace
+at any Price." Even the German CHANCELLOR will not be wholly pleased,
+for the debate revealed that, apart from the seven or eight gentlemen
+who follow the white flag of the Member for Blackburn, the House is
+absolutely fixed in its determination to defeat German militarism
+before talking of peace.
+
+After the searching analysis to which the hon. Member's confident
+statements were subjected by Lord ROBERT CECIL and Mr. A.F. WHYTE
+there was nothing left of them but a trace of acid.
+
+So far as I am aware the Member for Blackburn has never endangered the
+integrity of his principles by helping his country in any way to win
+the War. In this respect Mr. LEES SMITH, who seconded the motion, has
+a less consistent record, for he has worn khaki as an orderly of the
+R.A.M.C. But in his case service abroad seems only to have confirmed
+his peculiar principles, for he thinks that we ought to return the
+German colonies, and enable the natives to enjoy once again the
+blessings of _Kultur_. If he ever saw the Hun while he was in France
+it must have been through a pair of rose-tinted binoculars.
+
+_Thursday, May 17th_.--We are all agog to know whether the PRIME
+MINISTER'S offer of immediate Home Rule to twenty-six Counties of
+Ireland is to be blessed or banned by the Nationalists. This is the
+day when Irish Questions have priority, and the House hears such
+important inquiries as whether Hibernian holiday-makers will have
+their excursion-trains restored to them; what became of a side of
+bacon captured by the police during the Easter Monday rebellion, and
+why a certain magistrate should have been struck off the Commission of
+the Peace for a trifling refusal to take the oath of allegiance. Are
+we to go without this entertainment in the future, or will Mr. REDMOND
+refuse to rob Westminster of its gaiety even for the sake of College
+Green?
+
+If, as I ventured to suggest last week, the CHANCELLOR OF THE
+EXCHEQUER had laid in a stock of tobacco before the Budget he has
+evidently exhausted it by now, for, on his attention again being
+called to the exorbitant charge of the tobacconists, he no longer
+pooh-poohed the matter, but sternly declared that the situation was
+being closely watched.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    COMMERCIAL CANDOUR.
+
+    "The Car that never fails to give anything but satisfaction to
+    its owners."--_Advertisement in "Indian Motor News."_
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+[Illustration: _Amateur_ (_awaiting his turn to perform_). "A-ARE YOU
+NERVOUS, OLD CHAP?"
+
+_Infant Prodigy_ (_ditto_). "WHAT IS 'NERVOUS'?"]
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+MY AMERICAN COUSINS.
+
+  Because they speak the tongue that's mine,
+    Rich in the treasure that belongs
+  To them as well as me, and twine
+    Their heart-strings in our English songs,
+  I knew they'd scorn those German threats
+          And sham regrets.
+
+  Because their country's name is scrolled
+    With Liberty's; because her fate,
+  Like England's own, must be unrolled
+    In Freedom still, they had to hate
+  The thought of bowing down before
+          A Lord of War.
+
+  And now they'll lavish in the strife
+    The gold they've scorned to love too well,
+  And fleets to bring the food that's life,
+    And guns of death, and steel and shell;
+  Defeat or triumph, stand or fall,
+          They'll share their all.
+
+  They're out for business; now's their Day;
+    They took their time, but finished right;
+  The heat got slowly comes to stay;
+    Patient for peace means firm in fight;
+  And so their country still shall be
+          Land of the Free.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    "Remarkable scenes were witnessed at Exeter yesterday at the
+    free distribution of 10,000 lbs. of potatoes in 5 lb. lots.
+    Five thousand people obtained 5 lbs. each."--_Sunday Paper_.
+
+This result was obtained by the forethought of the distributors, who
+had the potatoes laid out on multiplication tables.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+[Illustration: _Farmer_. "WHAT THE BLAZES ARE YOU DOING? AND WITH THEM
+'ORSES STANDIN' HIDLE?"
+
+_Tommy_. "CLEANIN' ME BUTTONS. 'AVEN'T YOU NEVER BEEN A SOLDIER?"]
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+THE DOLLS THAT DID THEIR BIT.
+
+_"Je vous tends mon corbillon: qu'y met-on?"_ asked Jeanne, holding
+out her basket towards the first of her dolls seated in a semi-circle
+before her. Most of them were quite familiar with the game, but for
+the sake of a new-comer Jeanne had explained that each player must
+place in the basket some object the name of which ended with _on_, to
+rhyme with _corbillon_. She had announced that this time the game was
+in aid of a cause, and that therefore it must be played with _things_
+and not with words only.
+
+"Qu'y met-on, Marie?" repeated Jeanne. "Rappelez-vous bien que c'est
+une quête à l'intention des petites filles polonaises internées au
+camp de Havelberg!" What, Marie had nothing but her chain necklace,
+and that did not end in _on?_ No, but the links of the chain did,
+argued Jeanne. "Donne _des chaînons!_" she prompted in a whisper. "J'y
+mets des chaînons," said Marie in Jeanne's thinnest voice, and the
+necklace found its way into the basket.
+
+"_Je vous tends mon corbillon: qu'y met-on?_ À vous, Marthe. Ô,"
+exclaimed Jeanne, "tu y mets ton _chignon?_ Eh bien, tu sais, n'est-ce
+pas, bêta, qu'il faut que tu t'y mettes avec!" and into the basket she
+went after a lingering caress from Jeanne.
+
+_"Je vous tends mon corbillon: qu'y met-on?"_ It was the turn now of
+Yvonne in her bed. "Comment," said Jeanne, affecting indignation, "si
+tu n'étais pas si frileuse tu donnerais ton édredon?" And what about
+the little _poupées polonaises internées_, snatched from their beds
+and carried off without any bedclothes at all, let alone an eiderdown!
+Presently, "J'y mets mon édredon," Yvonne was understood to say, and
+"Sage!" approved Jeanne.
+
+_"Je vous tends mon corbillon: qu'y met-on?_ Jacques, mon pauvre ami,
+tu n'as pas de chance, hein?" There was no help for it; it was the
+only thing he had that rhymed. "Imagine la joie des petites polonaises
+internées!" she urged, taking the necessary action. "J'y mets mon
+pantalon," piped a disconsolate little thread of voice.
+
+_"Je vous tends mon corbillon: qu'y met-on?_ A vous, Mikadesse!" A
+beam of pleasure, succeeded by a falling of the countenance, then a
+look of decision, ended in a "Houp-là!" as the Japanese doll descended
+into the basket, and was made to say, "J'y mets une poupée du Japon!"
+After all she was an ally of the little polonaises.
+
+_"Je vous tends mon corbillon: qu'y met-on?_ Allons, les jumeaux! à
+vous!" Jeanne thought the twins were really in a plight and that she
+would have to help them out with a gift, but, quick as thought, Castor
+seized Pollux, saying, "J'y mets mon compagnon!" and Pollux, divining
+his intention, grasped Castor, declaring excitedly, "Et moi aussi,
+j'y mets mon compagnon" And into the basket they leapt together. "Ils
+s'entêtent à rester inséparables," sighed Jeanne; "c'est bien."
+
+_"Je vous tends mon corbillon: qu'y met-on?"_ Adélaïde never had
+possessed anything worth giving away, and yet she seemed to be
+suggesting that the contents of the basket did not look very imposing
+so far, and would hardly be enough to go round among so many little
+Poles, so Jeanne came to the rescue with gifts of toys until "J'y mets
+ma contribution!" came jubilantly forth in a voice that forgot to be
+Adélaïde's.
+
+All had now contributed. Yet Jeanne had a feeling that somehow it was
+not the end of the game. She pondered gravely for a few moments, then,
+placing herself solemnly before the mirror, she addressed herself:--
+
+_"Jeanne, je vous tends mon corbillon: qu'y met-on?"_ After a few
+seconds she began to see what she ought to do.
+
+"Qu'y mets-tu, Jeanne?" It would be rather hard, but she must do it.
+
+Sitting down and turning up the skirt of her frock, she took each of
+the contributors, kissed and caressed them, and placed them in her
+lap. Adélaïde only did she except, explaining to the others, "Oui,
+mes chéris, je garde Adélaïde, car savez-vous bien, c'est elle qui me
+donne des idées; je prends toujours conseil avec elle. Alors, n'est
+ce pas?" Then, carrying the dolls in her petticoat, she solemnly undid
+the button, let it slip down with the dolls inside, and placed it
+resolutely in the basket, saying: "J'y mets mon jupon!"
+
+What was Adélaïde saying? One must give cheerfully and not regret the
+gift? _Surtout il ne faut pas verser une larme!_
+
+So, hugging her doll, Jeanne returned to the mirror and added,
+smiling, "Avec sa-tis-fac-ti-on!"
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+[Illustration: _Officer's Servant_ (_replying to adverse criticism of
+war-worn charger_). "I 'EARD THE GUVNOR SAY THERE WAS THREE 'UNDRED
+QUID REFUSED FOR 'IM BEFORE THE WAR. WHAT DO YOU THINK OF THAT?"
+
+_Jock_. "WEEL, I'M THENKIN' THERE WAS TWA FOOLS MET THAT DAY, AND I
+DINNA KEN WHICH O' THEM WAS THE BIGGER."]
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    "Prospects in English Literature.
+         III.--Looking Backward."--_The Athenæum_.
+
+We trust this is only preliminary to a further advance.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    "Shepherds in Scotland are feeding lambs with whisky and
+    hot milk. Many titled landed proprietors are acting as
+    shepherds."--_Daily News_.
+
+Surely our Radical contemporary does not mean to suggest--
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+FAIRIES.
+
+  There are fairies at the bottom of our garden!
+    It's not so very, very far away;
+  You pass the gardener's shed and you just keep straight ahead;
+    I do so hope they've really come to stay.
+  There's a little wood, with moss in it and beetles,
+    And a little stream that quietly runs through;
+  You wouldn't think they'd dare to come merrymaking there--
+            Well, they do.
+
+  There are fairies at the bottom of our garden!
+    They often have a dance on summer nights;
+  The butterflies and bees make a lovely little breeze,
+    And the rabbits stand about and hold the lights.
+  Did you know that they could sit upon the moonbeams
+    And pick a little star to make a fan,
+  And dance away up there in the middle of the air?
+            Well, they can.
+
+  There are fairies at the bottom of our garden!
+    You cannot think how beautiful they are;
+  They all stand up and sing when the Fairy Queen and King
+    Come gently floating down upon their car.
+  The King is very proud and _very_ handsome;
+    The Queen--now can you guess who that could be
+  (She's a little girl all day, but at night she steals away)?--
+            Well--it's ME!
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+    "Young Lady Wanted, for few months, as Companion-Help
+    (seaside); fare paid and 6d. week pocket-money; or would
+    train Girl as Housemaid, same terms."--_Provincial Paper_.
+
+Such extravagance in war-time ought to be checked.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    "SHADY GERMAN TRICK.
+
+    "In the village of Boisleux-au-Mout the Germans utilised part
+    of the cemetery to bury their own dead, but before doing so
+    deliberately hewed down every tree growing on the side of the
+    ground where the French graves lie."--_Daily Paper_.
+
+Is "shady" quite the right word for this outrage?
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+PEAS AND PLEDGES.
+
+"Has anything special," I said, "been happening during my absence?"
+
+"We are up to our chins in work," said Francesca.
+
+"But is it real work?"
+
+"Of course it is. We've formed a General Committee, of which
+everybody's a member, including you, and we've formed an Executive
+Committee, of which there are about a dozen members. And then there
+are some Sub-Committees."
+
+"Yes, I know. The Executive Committee thinks it's going to do all the
+work, but it's got to report to the General Committee, and it it'll
+be a great piece of luck if the General Committee doesn't insist
+on asserting itself by upsetting all the decisions of the Executive
+Committee."
+
+"Oh, but our General Committee isn't going to be like that at all.
+There won't be any petty jealousy about our General Committee.
+Besides, the Executive Committee has power to act, and it doesn't need
+to report till the Annual Meeting of the General Committee, which is
+to be held a year from now. When that time comes lots of things will
+have happened."
+
+"That," I said, "is one of the truest things you've ever said. Even
+the War may be over by that time."
+
+"But if it isn't we shall all be living on swedes or pea-soup, or
+rice-bread or all three together; and we shall have a food controller
+in every village, and our Committees won't be wanted."
+
+"I beg your pardon; they'll be more wanted than ever to keep
+the controller straight and act as a buffer between him and the
+population."
+
+"But they won't know they're a buffer, and they won't like it when
+some tactless person tells them. Anyhow, that's a long way off, and in
+the meantime we've got the land."
+
+"Who've got what land?"
+
+"Our Committee," said Francesca, "have got two acres of land from
+Mr. Carberry, and we're going to grow a crop of peas on it so that
+everybody may have pea-soup in case of a pinch."
+
+"But what about the peas?" I said, "Have you made sure of those?"
+
+"We had a good deal of trouble about them, but we've got a firm
+promise of six bushels."
+
+"Capital! But are you quite sure you know how to bring the land and
+the peas together?"
+
+"Well, I'm not so much of an expert as I should like to be, but Mr.
+Bolton 's a practical farmer, and he's going to do all he can for us."
+
+"Will he plough it?"
+
+"It's been ploughed twice, so he's undertaken to harrow it and scarify
+it--doesn't it sound awful?--and then something else is going to
+happen to it, but I forget what it's called."
+
+"Wouldn't it be a good thing, at some stage or other, to plant the
+peas?"
+
+"Yes, it would; but you can't do it as simply as all that, can you?
+Isn't there something highly agricultural that you must do first?"
+
+"I should chuck 'em in and chance it."
+
+"A nice farmer you'd make," she said scornfully. "I'm remembering it
+now. It's got something to do with drills."
+
+"Like the Volunteers?"
+
+"No, not a bit like the Volunteers."
+
+"Well, then, like potatoes."
+
+"Yes, more like potatoes, except that they're peas in this case."
+
+"How true," I said.
+
+"Yes. And don't forget that while you were away we formed a League
+of Honour in the village and bound ourselves to observe the FOOD
+CONTROLLER'S rations."
+
+"Am I a member?"
+
+"Yes, we thought you'd like to be one, so I gave your name in."
+
+"I think a man must pledge his own honour. He can't have it done for
+him."
+
+"There's no public ceremony. You can just pledge yourself in your
+mind, and then put a pledge card in one of the windows."
+
+"I'll have tea first," I said, "and then I'll choose the window, and
+then I'll pledge myself in my mind."
+
+"No, you can do the pledging now."
+
+"I've done it, while you were talking."
+
+"And after all it's only the old rations according to Lord DEVONPORT,
+and we've been working under them for some time now."
+
+"So we have," I said; "but of course the card in the window makes all
+the difference."
+
+R.C.L.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+[Illustration: THE SERVANT PROBLEM.
+
+_Lady_. "AND WHY DID YOUR LAST MISTRESS----"
+
+_Applicant_ (_loftily_). "EXCUSE ME, MADAM!"
+
+_Lady_. "WELL--ER--YOUR LAST EMPLOYER----"
+
+_Applicant_. "I BEG YOUR PARDON, MADAM!"
+
+_Lady_. "WELL, THEN, YOUR LAST--ER--PRAY WHAT DO YOU CALL THOSE IN
+WHOSE SERVICE YOU ARE ENGAGED?"
+
+_Applicant_. "CLIENTS, MADAM." [_Collapse of interrogator_.]]
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    OUR MODEST CONTEMPORARIES.
+
+    "Had it been intended to make any new pronouncement of
+    importance the Berlin Government would have taken steps to
+    circulate the speech by wireless in time for publication in
+    'The Star' yesterday evening."--_The Star_.
+
+It is possible that Dr. BETHMANN-HOLLWEG was misled by our
+contemporary's habit of publishing its "7.0 Edition" at 4.30.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+From an obituary notice:--
+
+    "He had studied Eastern religions, and claimed to have been
+    initiated as a llama of Tibet."--_Daily Mail_.
+
+Or should it be the Grand Lama of Peru?
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    "The----Food Economy Committee were astounded yesterday at
+    the secretary's report of a collier's family of six persons
+    who consumed twenty half-quartern loaves in one week,
+    averaging twenty pounds of bread per person."--_Sunday
+    Chronicle_.
+
+It is not stated whether the astonishment was caused by the family's
+appetite or the secretary's arithmetic.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+[Illustration: _Fond Mother_ (_reading_). "'OUR CAPTAIN IS ONE OF THE
+BEST, AND WE'RE READY TO FOLLOW HIM TO H--L.' I SUPPOSE HE MEANS THE
+HINDENBURG LINE."]
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+OUR BOOKING-OFFICE.
+
+(_By Mr. Punch's Staff of Learned Clerks_.)
+
+In the list of heroic young soldier-authors whose gifts the War has
+revealed to us only to snatch them away, the name of DONALD HANKEY
+already holds an honoured place. It will, therefore, be good news to
+the many admirers of _A Student in Arms_ that a further selection of
+these heartening and fine-spirited papers has been prepared under the
+title of _A Student in Arms--Second Series_ (MELROSE). The thousands
+who already know and admire Lieut. HANKEY'S work will need no
+introduction to this, which exhibits all the qualities of courage
+and sympathy that have given the former book a world-wide popularity.
+They, and others, will however welcome the occasion afforded here of
+learning something about the life and personality of the writer, which
+they will do both from the short preface contributed by one whose
+identity is hardly disguised under the initials "H.M.A.H.," and from
+a couple of papers, autobiographical, that end the volume. Rugbieans
+especially will be interested to read DONALD HANKEY'S recollections of
+his school-days, with their tribute to the house-master affectionately
+known to so many generations as "Jackey." A book, in short, that will
+add to the admiration and regret with which its author is spoken of in
+three continents.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+_He Looked in My Window_ (CHATTO AND WINDUS), by ROBERT HALIFAX, gives
+the adventures of _Ruth Shadd_, decentest of dwellers in a meanish
+street, during her determined hunt for a husband. It would have been
+easy to make all this unlovely in its frankness, but the author very
+skilfully (and, I think, very sincerely) avoids this. _Ruth_ is a fine
+girl, with character and candour, those too rare assets, and having
+pursued, and found wanting, _Bert_, the swanker, who hasn't the
+courage for matrimony; the polite and fatuously prudent _Archie_, and
+_Joe_, the vegetarian, who had such exalted faith in malt, she wins
+a deserved happiness with someone that she had never even thought of
+pursuing. Mr. HALIFAX gives me an impression of almost cinematographic
+and gramophonic exactness in his portraiture. _George Shadd_, _Ruth's_
+father, who worked in the gasworks and was one of the very best,
+delighted me particularly, with his pathetic little garden, his battle
+with the slugs and black-fly, and his fine patience with _Mrs. Shadd_,
+who put her washing before his fire and her props among his choicest
+seedlings--a difficult woman indeed. The author writes with humour and
+sympathy; and that is the way to write of this brave if narrow life.
+It is the first time I have looked in Mr. HALIFAX'S window. I shall
+take steps to do so again. 'Tis a nice clean window.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Not even the most confirmed Gallio can avoid caring for _Arthur
+Stanton--A Memoir_, by the Rt. Hon. G.W.E. RUSSELL (LONGMANS), when
+he has once dipped his mind into the book. It is the record of a
+singularly beautiful and beneficent life, lived to the very utmost in
+the service of God and man, and ruled by a simple and direct religion
+which constantly forced practice up to the exalted level of precept.
+Judged by merely worldly standards of achievement, ARTHUR STANTON'S
+life could not be considered a success. He began as curate of St.
+Alban's, Holborn, and as curate of St. Alban's he ended after many
+years of enthusiastic devotion to humanity. He was foiled and thwarted
+by the great ones of the Church, inhibited in one place, suspended in
+another, and frequently doomed to find a Bishop or a Chaplain-General
+set, like a lion, across his path. But nothing could avail to stop
+him where he found a soul that could be saved or misery that could
+be relieved. His congregation, drawn from the slums of Holborn, would
+have died for him to a man, for they realised with how great an ardour
+his life was spent in order that he might help them. His faith was
+not a mystery kept apart for special occasions, but a daily and hourly
+influence vivifying his words and directing his actions. And no man
+could have enjoyed himself more than this true saint and interpreter
+of God to man. His religion was not one of gloom and foreboding, but a
+cheerful and delightful habit of mind and soul. _Tantum religio potuit
+suadere bonorum._ Mr. RUSSELL has done his work with great skill and
+perfect sympathy, and has produced a book that does honour to himself
+and to the beloved friend whom it is his privilege to commemorate.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The many readers of _Punch_ who took a close interest in ALEC
+JOHNSTON'S letters written "At the Back of the Front" and "At the
+Front" will be glad to have them in collected form. The memory of his
+gallant end--he was killed in action after the brilliant capture of
+a salient near Ypres, at the head of his company of Shropshires--is
+fresh in all our hearts. A preface to _At the Front_ (CONSTABLE)
+contains an appreciation of his high character and soldierly qualities
+by his friend and fellow-officer, Captain INGRAM, R.A.M.C., D.S.O.,
+M.C., who a few weeks later was himself killed. It is a fine tribute
+paid by one true soldier to another. These letters of ALEC JOHNSTON,
+as their editor reminds us, "were composed in the brief interludes
+snatched from hard fighting and hard fatigues. They never pretended
+to be more than the gay and cynical banter of one who brought to the
+perils of life at the Front an incurable habit of humour. They are
+typical of that brave spirit, essentially English, that makes light of
+the worst that fate can send."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+It must, I should think, be exceedingly difficult to find a new title
+in these days for a volume of reminiscences. Mr. RAYMOND BLATHWAYT
+seems to have solved the problem happily enough by calling his
+contribution to the rapidly-increasing library of recollections,
+_Through Life and Round the World_ (ALLEN). One way and another,
+first as a curate (rightly termed by the publishers "rather
+unconventional"), later as journalist, Mr. BLATHWAYT has contrived to
+use a pair of remarkably open eyes with excellent effect. The result
+is this fat volume, whose contents, if honesty constrains me to call
+the most of them gossip, are at least generally entertaining and never
+ill-natured. Needless to say, Mr. BLATHWAYT, like the elder _Capulet_,
+can "tell a tale such as will please." For myself, out of a goodly
+store, I should select for first honours a repartee, new to me, of
+Sir HERBERT TREE (forgive this dropping into rhyme!). It tells of a
+boastful old-time actor, vaunting his triumphs as _Hamlet_, when "the
+audience took fifteen minutes leaving the theatre." "_Was ha lame?_"
+If our only HERBERT did not in fact make this reply, I can only hope
+that he will at once hasten home and do so. But while we are upon Mr.
+BLATHWAYT'S dramatic recollections, I must respectfully traverse his
+dictum that some of the acting at the local pageants of a few years
+back "surpassed the very best I have seen upon the stage." As one who
+took a personal part in many of those well-meant revivals, and dates
+a relaxed throat from the effort of vociferating history, up-wind,
+towards a stand full of ear-straining auditors, I bow but remain
+unconvinced.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Although the literary style of Mr. JULIUS M. PRICE, of _The
+Illustrated London News_, is too breezy for my taste, I am glad to
+have read his _Six Months on the Italian Front_ (CHAPMAN AND HALL).
+Possibly he under-estimates our appreciation of Italy's share in the
+War's burden, but his account of the conditions prevailing upon the
+Italian front, and of the courage and skill with which they have been
+overcome, deserves our undiluted approval. It is difficult to believe
+that anyone who is not at least a member of the Alpine Club can
+dimly realise the engineering feats which the Italian soldiers have
+performed. Mr. PRICE has been given many opportunities of observation,
+and where none was given to him he has contrived to make them for
+himself. And the result is a book full of incident and excitement.
+I hope that he will pardon me when I add that my sense of gratitude
+would have been greater if, in addition to the photograph of
+himself--or even instead of it--he had given us a map. For the rest
+his illustrations are excellent.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+To MARTIN SWAYNE, officer in the R.A.M.C., on his lawful occasions
+or in the intervals of swatting flies _In Mesopotamia_ (HODDER AND
+STOUGHTON), there came some thoughts pleasant and bitter, and you can
+see that he has selected the pleasant and cut out the others, partly
+because of his loyalty and humour, and partly, no doubt, in deference
+to the prejudices of censorship. And he writes his selection of
+printable remarks in a very agreeable and not undistinguished idiom,
+pointing the narrative with reflections sane and sage enough. He
+has also made some water-colour notes (here reproduced in colour) of
+things seen; not remarkable, but adequate to convey an impression. We
+have all lamented the confusions (shall we call them?) of the medical
+service, and the trials of our troops in that blessed region entered
+through Kurna, the Gate of the Garden of Eden, in the early days of
+the Mesopotamian adventure. The author reports a radical improvement,
+and if Eden isn't exactly the name you'd give to this pest-ridden
+country at least the fighting men are now backed by the devotion and
+competence of the healing men, and all goes well for both. To the
+bulldog might well be added the retriever as our national emblem. We
+are some retrievers.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+[Illustration: OUR MIXED ARMY.
+
+_Refined Ex-Journalist_. "DON'T YOU THINK THAT COOK HAS STRESSED THE
+ONIONS A LITTLE IN THE STEW TO-DAY?"]
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+From an article headed "Outlook for Oil":--
+
+    "It is urged in commercial circles that the Government should
+    secure men with laboratory experience, plus a complete
+    absence of practical knowledge, to report on shale
+    deposits."--_Australian Paper_.
+
+We thought it was only in the Old Country that Governments had any use
+for that sort of man.
+
+
+
+***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI, VOL.
+152, MAY 23, 1917***
+
+
+******* This file should be named 15512-8.txt or 15512-8.zip *******
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+<title>The Project Gutenberg eBook of Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 152, May 23, 1917, by Various</title>
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+<h1>The Project Gutenberg eBook, Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 152, May
+23, 1917, by Various, Edited by Owen Seaman</h1>
+<pre>
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at <a href = "https://www.gutenberg.org">www.gutenberg.org</a></pre>
+<p>Title: Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 152, May 23, 1917</p>
+<p>Author: Various</p>
+<p>Release Date: March 31, 2005  [eBook #15512]</p>
+<p>Language: English</p>
+<p>Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1</p>
+<p>***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI, VOL. 152, MAY 23, 1917***</p>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<h4>E-text prepared by Jonathan Ingram, Sandra Brown,<br />
+    and the Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team</h4>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<hr class="full" />
+    <h1>PUNCH,<br />
+     OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI.</h1>
+
+    <h2>Vol. 152.</h2>
+    <hr class="full" />
+
+    <h2>May 23, 1917.</h2>
+    <hr class="full" />
+    <span class="pagenum"><a name="page329" id="page329"></a>[pg
+    329]</span>
+
+    <h2>CHARIVARIA.</h2>
+
+    <p>Mr. <span class="sc">William Watson</span> describes his new
+    book of verse, <i>The Man Who Saw</i>, as "an intermittent
+    commentary on the main developments and some of the collateral
+    phenomena of the War." People are already asking, "Why was a
+    man like this left out of the Dardanelles Commission?"</p>
+    <hr class="short" />
+
+    <p>Weeds are a source of great trouble to the amateur gardener,
+    says a contemporary, because he is not always able to recognise
+    them. A good plan is to pull them out of the ground. If they
+    come up again they are weeds.</p>
+    <hr class="short" />
+
+    <p>We hope that Mr. <span class="sc">Charles Cochran</span> is
+    not indisposed, but we have not noticed a new revue by him this
+    week.</p>
+    <hr class="short" />
+
+    <p>Sulphur from Italy is being distributed by the Explosives
+    Committee. This body must not be confused with the Expletives
+    Committee, which gets it supply of sulphur straight from the
+    Front.</p>
+    <hr class="short" />
+
+    <p>The Metropolitan Water Board is appealing against waste of
+    water. It is proposed to provide patriotic householders with
+    attractive cards stating that the owner of the premises in
+    which the card is displayed is bound in honour not to touch the
+    stuff.</p>
+    <hr class="short" />
+
+    <p>According to a member of the Inventions Board, over two
+    thousand solutions of the U-boat problem have already been
+    received. Unfortunately this is more than the number of U-boats
+    available for experiment, but it is hoped that by strictly
+    limiting the allowance to one submarine per invention the
+    question may be determined in a manner satisfactory to the
+    greatest possible number.</p>
+    <hr class="short" />
+
+    <p>Of eight applications received by the Barnes Council for the
+    vacancy of Inspector of Nuisances three came from men of
+    military age. It is expected that the Council will suggest that
+    these gentlemen should be invited to inspect the nuisances in
+    front of the British trenches.</p>
+    <hr class="short" />
+
+    <p>The proprietor of thirteen steam rollers told the Egham
+    Tribunal that in two years he had only been able to take one of
+    them out of the yard. We cannot think that he has really tried.
+    Much might have been done with kindness and a piece of cheese,
+    while we have often seen quite large steam rollers being
+    enticed along the road by a man with a red flag.</p>
+    <hr class="short" />
+
+    <p>A Swiss correspondent is informed that "Hindenburg's legs
+    are no longer strong enough to support him." The weakness
+    appears to be gradually extending to his arms.</p>
+    <hr class="short" />
+
+    <p>"The starched collar must go," remarks a contemporary
+    ruefully. Not, we hope, before a substitute has been found for
+    some of those unwashable necks.</p>
+    <hr class="short" />
+
+    <p>"Lady conductors," said the Underground Railway official
+    last week, "must remember that the seats and straps are put
+    there for the use of the passengers." We know all about straps,
+    but we have often wondered what it feels like to use one of the
+    seats on the Underground.</p>
+    <hr class="short" />
+
+    <p>The police have raided a coining plant in Marylebone. It is
+    becoming more and more difficult to make money.</p>
+    <hr class="short" />
+
+    <p>Under a recent Government order the importation of wild
+    animals into Great Britain is forbidden. Allotment holders
+    throughout the country hope the order will be read out to any
+    wireworm or potato-moth that attempts to land at our ports.</p>
+    <hr class="short" />
+
+    <p>A deputation to the <span class="sc">Food Controller</span>
+    has demanded that the allowance of bread to farm labourers
+    should be increased to two pounds per head per day. The amount
+    is considered excessive in view of the national needs, and the
+    alternative course of permitting them to eat all they can grow
+    is being favourably considered.</p>
+    <hr class="short" />
+
+    <p>Mr. <span class="sc">Mitchel</span>, the Mayor of New York,
+    has forbidden musicians to play the National Anthems of the
+    Allies in ragtime. Mr. <span class="sc">Mitchel</span> is a
+    great humanitarian and simply hates the sound of anything in
+    pain.</p>
+    <hr class="short" />
+
+    <p>The German Society of Actors and Singers had forbidden its
+    members to sing in the United States. Enthusiasts from the
+    latter country are planning an early trip to Northern France
+    rather than miss entertainment in the Siegfried and Wotan
+    line.</p>
+    <hr class="short" />
+
+    <p>Following so closely upon the report that a Wallasey woman
+    had discovered a German coin in a loaf of bread we were not
+    surprised by a contemporary headline, "Seymour Hicks in a new
+    Rôle."</p>
+    <hr class="short" />
+
+    <p>Damage to the extent of twenty-five thousand pounds is said
+    to have been caused to the crops in Australia by mice, and the
+    Australian authorities contemplate the purchase of a mouse
+    trap.</p>
+    <hr />
+
+    <div class="figcenter" style="width:40%;">
+        <a href="images/329.png"><img width="100%"
+        src="images/329.png" alt="Economist (soliloquising)." />
+        </a>
+
+        <p><i>Economist</i> (<i>soliloquising</i>).
+        <span class="sc">"We must all deny ourselves something. And
+        to think, despite the paper shortage, people are still
+        smoking cigarettes."</span></p>
+    </div>
+    <hr />
+
+    <blockquote class="note">
+        <h4>An Irish Settlement.</h4>
+
+        <p>"Miss &mdash;&mdash;, who elected to serve fourteen
+        days' imprisonment rather than pay a fine for an alleged
+        assault arising out of a little commotion in Cork, was, on
+        her release from prison, presented with a gold mounted
+        umbrella in compensation for the one she broke on a
+        policeman's head."&mdash;<i>Evening Herald</i>
+        (<i>Dublin</i>).</p>
+    </blockquote>
+
+    <p>In view of the admission in the last sentence, "alleged" is
+    good.</p>
+    <hr />
+
+    <blockquote class="note">
+        <p>"New York, Friday.&mdash;An elaborate programme of
+        welcome will be escorted to the City Hall, which has been
+        prepared. The British Mission has been strikingly decorated
+        for the occasion with innumerable British and Allied
+        flags."&mdash;<i>Liverpool Post</i>.</p>
+    </blockquote>
+
+    <p>We are not anxiously awaiting a snapshot of Mr.
+    <span class="sc">Balfour</span> in his latest costume.</p>
+    <hr />
+
+    <blockquote class="note">
+        <p>"The vessels are at present under construction by the
+        Kawashi Dockyard Company, Limited, of Kobe, and realised
+        from £42 to £42 per ton deadweight."&mdash;<i>Poverty Bay
+        Herald</i>.</p>
+    </blockquote>
+
+    <p>A careful calculation will show that the average cost was
+    almost exactly forty guineas.</p>
+    <hr />
+
+    <blockquote class="note">
+        <p>"Several rhubord recipes have come in this week, so that
+        the reader who esquired for recipe for rhubard jelly is
+        supplied with this, and recipes for other rhubarb dainties
+        as well."&mdash;<i>Edmonton Journal</i>
+        (<i>Canada</i>).</p>
+    </blockquote>
+
+    <p>If <i>John Gilpin</i> were to "dine at Edmonton" (Canada) he
+    would come in for some nice new vegetables.</p>
+    <hr />
+    <span class="pagenum"><a name="page330" id="page330"></a>[pg
+    330]</span>
+
+    <h2>A PLACE OF ARMS.</h2>
+
+    <blockquote class="note">
+        <p>[Inscribed by a humble member of the Inner Temple to the
+        Benchers of his Inn.]</p>
+    </blockquote>
+
+    <div class="poem">
+        <div class="stanza">
+            <p>I knew a garden green and fair,</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">Flanking our London river's tide,</p>
+
+            <p>And you would think, to breathe its air</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">And roam its virgin lawns beside,</p>
+
+            <p>All shimmering in their velvet fleece,</p>
+
+            <p>"Nothing can hurt this haunt of Peace."</p>
+        </div>
+
+        <div class="stanza">
+            <p>No trespass marred that close retreat;</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">Privileged were the few that went</p>
+
+            <p>Pacing its walks with measured beat</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">On legal contemplation bent;</p>
+
+            <p>And Inner Templars used to say:</p>
+
+            <p>"How well our garden looks today!"</p>
+        </div>
+
+        <div class="stanza">
+            <p>But That which changes all has changed</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">This guarded pleasaunce, green and
+            fair,</p>
+
+            <p>And soldier-ranks therein have ranged</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">And trod its beauty hard and bare,</p>
+
+            <p>Have tramped and tramped its fretted floor</p>
+
+            <p>Learning the discipline of War.</p>
+        </div>
+
+        <div class="stanza">
+            <p>And many a moon of Peace shall climb</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">Above that mimic Field of Mars</p>
+
+            <p>Before the healing touch of Time</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">With springing green shall hide its
+            scars;</p>
+
+            <p>But Inner Templars smile and say:</p>
+
+            <p>"Our barrack-square looks well today."</p>
+        </div>
+
+        <div class="stanza">
+            <p>Good was that garden in their eyes,</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">Lovely its spell of long-ago;</p>
+
+            <p>Now waste and mired its glory lies,</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">And yet they hold it dearer so,</p>
+
+            <p>Who see beneath the wounds it bears</p>
+
+            <p>A grace no other garden wears.</p>
+        </div>
+
+        <div class="stanza">
+            <p>For still the memory, never sere,</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">But fresh as after fallen rain,</p>
+
+            <p>Of those who learned their lesson here</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">And may not ever come again,</p>
+
+            <p>Gives to this garden, bruised and browned,</p>
+
+            <p>A greenness as of hallowed ground.</p>
+        </div>
+    </div>
+
+    <p class="author">O.S.</p>
+    <hr />
+
+    <h2>RANDOM FLIGHTS.</h2>
+
+    <h4 class="sc">By Marcus Macleod.</h4>
+
+    <p class="ctr">(<i>With renewed acknowledgments to "The
+    Skittish Weekly."</i>)</p>
+
+    <p>It was with inexpressible relief that I heard of the narrow
+    escape of the Rev. Urijah Basham. Presiding at a jumble sale at
+    Sidcup he described how he had been within an ace of partaking
+    of rhubarb leaves at luncheon on the previous day, but, having
+    read in the morning's paper of their fatal results, wisely
+    decided to abstain. I need hardly remind my readers that Mr.
+    Basham is, after the Rev. <span class="sc">Joseph
+    Hocking</span>, perhaps our greatest preacher-novelist. The
+    jumble sale was held in the beautiful concert hall of the
+    Sidcup Temperance Congregational Reed Band. The Dowager-Lady
+    Bowler, Sir Moses Pimblett, and the Rev. Chadley Bandman were
+    amongst those who graced the function with their presence.</p>
+    <hr class="short" />
+
+    <p>A correspondent has kindly sent me a copy of <i>The Little
+    Diddlington Parish Magazine</i> for April. In it there is an
+    interesting letter claiming that the original of <i>Mr.
+    Pickwick</i> was a benevolent gentleman named Swizzle, who was
+    temporarily employed as perpetual curate of Little Diddlington
+    in the sixties. The evidence on which this identification is
+    founded seems to me somewhat unconvincing, as <i>Pickwick</i>
+    was published in the year 1836. But Nature, as it has been
+    finely said, often borrows from Art, and Fact may similarly be
+    inspired to emulate Fiction.</p>
+    <hr class="short" />
+
+    <p>I promised not to trouble my readers again with the Mystery
+    of the Man in the Iron Mask. But I may be allowed merely to
+    mention that there is an excellent study of the subject in
+    <i>The Methodist Monthly</i>, by my old friend, Professor
+    Corker. The article, which runs to nearly seventy pages, does
+    the utmost credit to this brilliant writer, who comes to the
+    conclusion that no satisfactory solution of the mystery has
+    ever been propounded or ever can be. But while his examination
+    of the different theories is singularly free from bias he is
+    evidently impressed by the ingenious view of Dr. Amos Stoot,
+    the eminent Chicago alienist, that the masked inmate of the
+    Bastille immured himself voluntarily in order to investigate
+    the conditions of French prison life at the time, but, owing to
+    the homicidal development of his subliminal consciousness, was
+    detained indefinitely by the authorities, and during his
+    imprisonment wrote the <i>Letters of Junius</i>.</p>
+    <hr class="short" />
+
+    <p>I have been reading with much enjoyment, and I hope profit,
+    a book entitled <i>Behind the Ivory Gate; Being the
+    Reminiscences of a Dentist</i>, by Orlando Pullar, F.R.D.S. Mr.
+    Pullar's opportunities for studying the psychology of his
+    clients have been exceptional, and he has turned them to rich
+    account in these fascinating pages. He is, moreover, as adroit
+    with his pen as with the instruments of his humane and
+    benevolent calling, and has a pretty wit. Thus he tells us that
+    his villa at Balham is named "Tusculum," and that, in view of
+    the fact that three generations of Pullars have been dentists,
+    his family can be said to be of "old extraction." This pleasant
+    quip I seem to have heard before; but, with all deductions,
+    there are many signs here of a strong sagacious mind, that
+    brings to bear on all the jars of daily life the priceless
+    emollient of moral uplift.</p>
+    <hr />
+
+    <div class="figcenter" style="width:100%;">
+        <a href="images/331.png"><img width="70%"
+        src="images/331.png" alt="THE HYPNOTIST" /></a>
+
+        <h3>THE HYPNOTIST.</h3>
+
+        <p><span class="sc">Bethmann-Hollweg</span>: "KEEP LOOKING
+        AT ME. YOU'RE WINNING THE WAR! YOU'RE WINNING THE WAR!
+        YOU'RE WINNING THE WAR!"</p>
+    </div>
+    <hr />
+
+    <h2>THE MUD LARKS.</h2>
+
+    <p>Never have I seen a kiltie platoon wading through the cold
+    porridge of snow and slush of which our front used to be
+    composed, but I have said, with my French friend, "<i>Mon Dieu,
+    les currents d'air!</i>" and thank Fate that I belong to a race
+    which reserves its national costume for fancy-dress balls.</p>
+
+    <p>It is very well for MacAlpine of Ben Lomond, who has stalked
+    his haggis and devoured it raw, who beds down on thistles for
+    preference and grows his own fur; but it is very hard on Smith
+    of Peckham, who through no fault of his own finds himself in a
+    Highland regiment, trying to make his shirt-tails do where his
+    trousers did before. But the real heather-mixture,
+    double-distilled Scot is a hardy bird with different ideas from
+    <i>nous autres</i> as to what is cold: also as to what is hot.
+    Witness the trying experience of our Albert Edward.</p>
+
+    <p>Our Albert Edward and a Hun rifle grenade arrived at the
+    same place at the same time, intermingled and went down to the
+    Base to be sifted. In the course of time came a wire from our
+    Albert Edward, saying he had got the grenade out of his system
+    and was at that moment at the railhead; were we going to send
+    him a horse or weren't we?</p>
+
+    <p>Emma was detailed for the job, which was a mistake, because
+    Emma was not the mount for a man who had been softening for
+    five months in hospital. She had only two speeds in her
+    repertoire, a walk which slung you up and down her back from
+    her ears to her croup, and a trot which jarred your teeth loose
+    and rattled the buttons off your tunic. However, she went to
+    the railhead and Albert Edward mounted her, threw the clutch
+    into the first speed and hammered out the ten miles to our
+    camp, arriving smothered in snow and so stiff we had to lift
+    him down, so raw it was a mockery to offer him a chair, and
+    therefore he had to take his tea off the mantelpiece.</p>
+
+    <p>We advised a visit to Sandy. Sandy was the hot bath
+    merchant. He lurked in a dark barn at the end of the village,
+    and could be found there at anytime of any day, brooding over
+    the black cauldrons in which the baths were brewed, his
+    Tam-o'-shanter drooped over one eye, steam condensing on his
+    blue nose. Theoretically the hot baths were free, but in
+    practice a franc pressed into Sandy's forepaw was found to have
+    a strong calorific effect on the water.</p>
+
+    <p>So down the village on all fours, groaning like a Dutch brig
+    in a cross-sea, went our Albert Edward. He crawled into the
+    dark barn and, having <!--page 331 full page illustration-->
+    <span class="pagenum"><a name="page332" id="page332"></a>[pg
+    332]</span> no smaller change, contributed a two-franc bill to
+    the forepaw and told Sandy about his awful stiffness. His
+    eloquence and the double fee broke Sandy's heart. With great
+    tears in his eyes he assured Albert Edward that the utmost
+    resources of his experience and establishment should be
+    mobilised on his (Albert Edward's) behalf, and ushered him
+    tenderly into that hidden chamber, constructed of sacking
+    screens, which was reserved for officers. Albert Edward peeled
+    his clothes gingerly from him, and Sandy returned to his
+    cauldrons.</p>
+
+    <p>The peeling complete, Albert Edward sat in the draughts of
+    the inner chamber and waited for the bath. The outer chamber
+    was filled with smoke, and the flames were leaping six feet
+    above the cauldrons; but every time Albert Edward holloaed for
+    his bath Sandy implored another minute's grace.</p>
+
+    <p>Finally Albert Edward could stand the draughts no longer and
+    ordered Sandy, on pain of court-martial and death, to bring the
+    water, hot or not.</p>
+
+    <p>Whereupon Sandy reluctantly brought his buckets along, and,
+    grumbling that neither his experience nor establishment had had
+    a fair chance, emptied them into the tub. Albert Edward stepped
+    in without further remark and sat down.</p>
+
+    <p>The rest of the story I had from my groom and countryman,
+    who, along with an odd hundred other people, happened to be
+    patronising the outer chamber tubs at the time. He told me that
+    suddenly they heard "a yowl like a man that's afther bein' bit
+    be a mad dog," and over the screen of the inner chamber came
+    our Albert Edward in his birthday dress. "Took it in his
+    sthride, Sor, an' coursed three laps round the bath-house
+    cursin' the way he'd wither the Divil," said my groom and
+    countryman; "then he ran out of the door into the snow an' lay
+    down in it." He likewise told me that Albert Edward's
+    performance had caused a profound sensation among the other
+    bathers, and they inquired of Sandy as to the cause thereof;
+    but Sandy shook his Tam-o'-shanter and couldn't tell them;
+    hadn't the vaguest idea. The water he had given Albert Edward
+    was hardly scalding, he said; hardly scalding, with barely one
+    packet of mustard dissolved in it.</p>
+
+    <p>Our Albert Edward is still taking his meals off the
+    mantelpiece.</p>
+
+    <p>I met my friend, the French battery commander, yesterday. He
+    was cantering a showy chestnut mare over the turf, humming a
+    tune aloud. He looked very fit and very much in love with the
+    world. I asked him what he meant by it. He replied that he
+    couldn't help it; everybody was combining to make him happy;
+    his C.O. had fallen down a gun-pit and broken a leg; he had won
+    two hundred francs from his pet enemy; he had discovered a
+    jewel of a cook; and then there was always the Boche, the
+    perfectly priceless, absolutely ridiculous, screamingly funny
+    little Boche. The Boche, properly exploited, was a veritable
+    fount of joy. He dreaded the end of the War, he assured me, for
+    a world without Boches would be a salad sans the dressing.</p>
+
+    <p>I inquired as to how the arch-humourist had been excelling
+    himself lately.</p>
+
+    <p>The Captain passaged his chestnut alongside my bay, chuckled
+    and told me all about it. It appeared that one wet night he was
+    rung up by the Infantry to say that the neighbouring Hun was up
+    to some funny business, and would he stand by for a barrage,
+    please?</p>
+
+    <p>What sort of funny business was the Hun putting up?</p>
+
+    <p>Oh, a rocket had gone up over the way and they thought it
+    was a signal for some frightfulness or other.</p>
+
+    <p>He stood by for half an hour, and then, as nothing happened,
+    turned in. Ten minutes later the Infantry rang up again. More
+    funny business; three rockets had gone up.</p>
+
+    <p>He stood by for an hour with no result, then sought his bunk
+    once more, cursing all men. Confound the Infantry getting the
+    jumps over a rocket or two! Confound them two times! Then a
+    spark of inspiration glowed within him, glowed and flamed
+    brightly. If his exalted <i>poilus</i> got the wind up over a
+    handful of rockets, how much more also would the deteriorating
+    Boche?</p>
+
+    <p>Gurgling happily, he brushed the rats off his chest and the
+    beetles off his face, turned over and went to sleep. Next
+    morning he wrote a letter to his "god-mother" in Paris ("<i>une
+    petite femme, très intelligente, vous savez</i>"), and ten days
+    later her parcels came tumbling in. The first night (a Monday)
+    he gave a modest display, red and white rockets bursting into
+    green stars every five minutes. Tuesday night more rockets,
+    with a few Catherine-wheels thrown in. Wednesday night,
+    Catherine-wheels and golden rain, and so on until the end of
+    the week, when they finished up with a grand special attraction
+    and all-star programme, squibs, Catherine-wheels, Roman
+    candles, Prince of Wales' feathers, terminating in a blinding,
+    fizzing barrage of coloured rockets, and "God bless our Home"
+    in golden stars.</p>
+
+    <p>"All very pretty," said I, "but what were the results?"</p>
+
+    <p>"Precisely what I anticipated. A deserter came over
+    yesterday who was through it all and didn't intend to go
+    through it again. They had got the wind up properly, he said,
+    hadn't had a wink of sleep for a week. His officers had
+    scratched themselves bald-headed trying to guess what it was
+    all about. All ranks stood to continuously, up to their waists
+    in mud, frozen stiff and half drowned, while <i>my</i> brave
+    little rogues of <i>poilus</i>, mark you, slept warm in their
+    dug-outs, and the only man on duty was the lad who was touching
+    the fireworks off. O friend of mine, there is much innocent fun
+    to be got out of the Boche if you'll only give him a
+    chance!"</p>
+
+    <p class="author">Patlander.</p>
+    <hr />
+
+    <div class="figcenter" style="width:40%;">
+        <a href="images/332.png"><img width="100%"
+        src="images/332.png"
+        alt="Verger (to Mrs. Smith, about to wed for fourth time)." />
+        </a>
+
+        <p><i>Verger</i> (<i>to Mrs. Smith, about to wed for fourth
+        time</i>). "<span class="sc">Very unusual indeed, Mrs.
+        Smith. I can't remember any of the other three being quite
+        so late as this</span>."</p>
+    </div>
+    <hr />
+
+    <blockquote class="note">
+        <p>"The position of men who were not 41 before June 24,
+        1917, and who have since attained 41 is again the subject
+        of much confusion."&mdash;<i>Daily Dispatch</i>.</p>
+    </blockquote>
+
+    <p>We can well believe this.</p>
+    <hr />
+    <span class="pagenum"><a name="page333" id="page333"></a>[pg
+    333]</span>
+
+    <div class="figcenter" style="width:100%;">
+        <a href="images/333.png"><img width="100%"
+        src="images/333.png"
+        alt="'OH, MUMMY! ANYTHING BUT THAT! I'D RATHER HAVE A HARD SMACK--_ANYWHERE YOU LIKE_.'" />
+        </a>
+
+        <p><i>Mollie</i> (<i>who has been naughty and condemned to
+        "no toast"</i>). <span class="sc">"Oh, Mummy! Anything but
+        that! I'd rather have a hard smack&mdash;<i>anywhere YOU
+        LIKE</i></span>."</p>
+    </div>
+    <hr />
+
+    <h3>A CURE FOR CURIOSITY.</h3>
+
+    <p class="ctr">(<i>An Idealistic Fable</i>.)</p>
+
+    <div class="poem">
+        <div class="stanza">
+            <p>Alfonso Ebenezer Scutt</p>
+
+            <p>Could never keep his mouth close shut;</p>
+
+            <p>And when I mention that his tongue</p>
+
+            <p>Was flexible and loosely hung,</p>
+
+            <p>You will begin to understand</p>
+
+            <p>Why he was honoured in our land.</p>
+        </div>
+
+        <div class="stanza">
+            <p>A lucky <i>coup</i> in mining shares</p>
+
+            <p>Released him from financial cares,</p>
+
+            <p>And though his wife was strangely plain&mdash;</p>
+
+            <p>A lady of Peruvian strain&mdash;</p>
+
+            <p>She had a handsome revenue</p>
+
+            <p>Derived from manganese and glue.</p>
+
+            <p>Thus fortified, in Nineteen-Six</p>
+
+            <p>Alfonso entered politics,</p>
+
+            <p>Ousting from Sludgeport-on-the-Ouse</p>
+
+            <p>A Tory of old-fashioned views.</p>
+
+            <p>Alfonso Scutt, though wont to preach</p>
+
+            <p>In chapels, rarely made a speech,</p>
+
+            <p>But managed very soon to climb</p>
+
+            <p>To eminence at Question Time.</p>
+
+            <p>Fired by insatiable thirst</p>
+
+            <p>For knowledge, from the very first</p>
+
+            <p>He launched upon an endless series</p>
+
+            <p>Of quite unnecessary queries,</p>
+
+            <p>Till overworked officials came</p>
+
+            <p>To loathe the mention of his name.</p>
+
+            <p>At last their anguish grew so keen</p>
+
+            <p>The Premier had to intervene,</p>
+
+            <p>And by a tactful master-stroke</p>
+
+            <p>Relieved them from Alfonso's yoke.</p>
+
+            <p>By way of liberal reward</p>
+
+            <p>He made the childless Scutt a lord,</p>
+
+            <p>And then despatched him on a Mission</p>
+
+            <p>In honorific recognition</p>
+
+            <p>Of presents sent for our relief</p>
+
+            <p>By a renowned New Guinea Chief.</p>
+
+            <p>The natives of those distant parts</p>
+
+            <p>Are noted for their generous hearts,</p>
+
+            <p>But, spite of protests raised by us,</p>
+
+            <p>Continue anthropophagous.</p>
+
+            <p>And this, I have no doubt, was why,</p>
+
+            <p>When Members wished Lord Scutt good-bye,</p>
+
+            <p>You could not see one humid eye.</p>
+        </div>
+    </div>
+    <hr class="short" />
+
+    <div class="poem">
+        <div class="stanza">
+            <p>The moral of this simple strain</p>
+
+            <p>I trust is adequately plain.</p>
+
+            <p>When people crave for information</p>
+
+            <p>Unfit, in war, for publication,</p>
+
+            <p>They take a line, from vice or levity,</p>
+
+            <p>That's not conducive to longevity.</p>
+        </div>
+    </div>
+    <hr />
+
+    <h3>AN AFRICAN APPEAL.</h3>
+
+    <p>The Baboo must look to his laurels, for other dusky
+    aspirants to fluent articulate culture are on the warpath, and
+    they are by no means to be underrated. I have seen lately quite
+    a number of letters from young studious gentlemen of Ashantee,
+    who, having acquired a little English, desire more, and develop
+    a passion for correspondence with English strangers, whose
+    names they pick up. The following typical example, dated March
+    9th, 1917, will serve to illustrate the new habit:&mdash;</p>
+
+    <blockquote>
+        <p>"<span class="sc">Dear Sir</span>,&mdash;I am with much
+        pleasure to indite you about your name that has come to my
+        hand with great, joy. On the receipt of this letter, know
+        that I want to be one of your fellow friends. You have been
+        reported to me by a friend of mine of your good attention
+        and benevolences. My openion of writing you is to say, I
+        want to take you as my favourite friend. Everything or news
+        that may be happened there at your side, I wish you to
+        report same to me. And I also shall report same to you
+        satisfaction. Will you be good enough to agree with me?
+        Then I hope to get few lines of news from you being as you
+        consented or disconsented. To have a friend at abroad is
+        something that delights the life. I am earnestly requested
+        to hear from you soon. I beg to detain, dear Sir,</p>
+
+        <p class="quotsig">&quot;Yrs truly,<br />
+         &mdash;&mdash;."</p>
+    </blockquote>
+
+    <p>To whom do you think that letter is addressed? You would
+    suppose to some public personage with a reputation for cordial
+    sympathy with the young and earnest, such as the
+    <span class="sc">Chief Scout</span>, for instance. But no, the
+    "Dear Sir" is in reality a limited liability company, one of
+    whose circulars, I suppose, wandered to the Gold Coast.</p>
+    <hr />
+    <span class="pagenum"><a name="page334" id="page334"></a>[pg
+    334]</span>
+
+    <h2>THE LAW COURTS THEATRE.</h2>
+
+    <h4>"ROMNEY'S RUM 'UN."</h4>
+
+    <p>London was probably never richer in comic actors than at the
+    present moment, for not only is W.H.
+    <span class="sc">Berry</span> at the Adelphi,
+    <span class="sc">Leslie Henson</span> at the Gaiety,
+    <span class="sc">Arthur Roberts</span> at the Oxford singing
+    his old songs, and <span class="sc">Robert Hale</span> and
+    <span class="sc">George Robey</span> twice daily elsewhere, but
+    in the Law Courts Playhouse <span class="sc">Charles
+    Darling</span> has been lately at his very best. Dropping in
+    there last week, during the performance of a new farce,
+    entitled <i>Romney's Rum 'Un</i>, I was again fascinated by the
+    inexhaustible wit and allusive badinage of this great little
+    comedian, beside whose ready gagging <span class="sc">George
+    Graves</span> himself is inarticulate. Had not
+    <span class="sc">George Robey</span> invented for application
+    to himself the descriptive phrase, "The Prime Minister of
+    Mirth," it should be at once affixed to the Law Courts'
+    fun-maker; but, since it is too late to use that, let us think
+    of him as "The Chancellor of the Exchequer of Mirth."</p>
+
+    <p><span class="sc">Charles Darling's</span> success is the
+    more remarkable because he keeps so still. He sits in his chair
+    as steadily as another of his outdistanced rivals,
+    <span class="sc">Sam Mayo</span> ("The Immobile Comedian," as
+    he is called), remains standing. He has few gestures; he
+    rarely, if ever, sings, and I have never seen him dance; and
+    yet the way in which he "gets over" is astonishing. "Laughter
+    holding both his sides" is the most constant attendant of this
+    theatre.</p>
+
+    <p>What is the secret? Well, first and foremost it is of course
+    to be sought in the genius of the actor himself; but
+    contributory causes are the acceptivity of the audience, which
+    is more noticeable in the Law Courts than in any other London
+    theatre, and the willingness of his fellow-performers to "feed"
+    him, as stage-folk have it; that is to say, provide him with
+    materials upon which (again resorting to stage language) he may
+    "crack his wheezes." The other day, for example, that excellent
+    comedian, <span class="sc">John Simon</span>, was his principal
+    ally in this way, and nothing could have been better than the
+    sympathy between the two funny men. To <span class="sc">Charles
+    Darling</span> naturally fell the fat of the dialogue, but no
+    one enjoyed the treat more than <span class="sc">John
+    Simon</span>, in whose dictionary the word jealousy does not
+    exist. <span class="sc">Leslie Scott</span> also did his best
+    to "feed" his principal, and the results were a scream.</p>
+
+    <p>If the jokes were now and then a little legal, what did it
+    matter? Many of the audience were legal too, and that there is
+    no better audience the reports of the farces played here day
+    after day abundantly prove. They are out for fun, and therefore
+    in an appreciative and complaisant mood.</p>
+
+    <p>To prove a comedian's genius to the mere reader is a
+    difficult matter, and one can never hope to re-embody him in
+    all his humorous idiosyncracies; but quotation comes to one's
+    aid, and in the case of such a wit as <span class="sc">Charles
+    Darling</span> it is invaluable. Thus <span class="sc">John
+    Simon</span>, referring to Mrs.
+    <span class="sc">Siddons</span>' unwieldiness in her old age,
+    said that in a certain part she had to be helped from her knees
+    by two attendants. Quick as lightning came the comment, "When
+    she was younger she was able to rise on her own merits." Was
+    ever so exquisitely funny and unexpected a turn given to the
+    dull word "merits"? Another perfect thing from this diverting
+    piece, followed also by Homeric cachinnations, was the
+    mock-serious apophthegm: "If a cloud is going to support a lady
+    of substantial proportions, you must make it fairly solid."</p>
+
+    <p>I came away with reluctance, filled with wonder at the want
+    of enterprise shown by our revue-managers in not having, long
+    ere now, secured <span class="sc">Charles Darling's</span>
+    services. If only he continues to take his art seriously he has
+    a great future. Meanwhile I am applying embrocation to my sore
+    sides.</p>
+    <hr />
+
+    <h3>NATURE NOTES.</h3>
+
+    <blockquote>
+        <p class="ctr">&nbsp;</p>
+
+        <p class="quotsig"><i>The Gloaming</i>,"<br />
+        <i>North Kensington</i>.</p>
+
+        <p><span class="sc">Dear Mr. Punch</span>,&mdash;I wonder
+        if any of your intelligent readers have noticed the
+        wonderful adaptability of Nature, of which I send you the
+        following remarkable instance:&mdash;The yellowhammer,
+        which we are always told sings, "A little bit of bread and
+        no che-e-ese," has (unless my ears grossly deceive me)
+        changed its words this year to "A little bit of cheese and
+        no bre-e-ead!" Need I say more?</p>
+
+        <p class="quotsig">Your obedient servant,<br />
+        <span class="sc">Observator</span>.</p>
+    </blockquote>
+    <hr />
+
+    <blockquote class="note">
+        <p>"Mr. Isaac L. &mdash;&mdash; is in Cape Town. We hope
+        the change will do Mrs. L. &mdash;&mdash;
+        good."&mdash;<i>Weekly Paper</i>.</p>
+    </blockquote>
+
+    <p>We trust that no domestic differences are indicated.</p>
+    <hr />
+
+    <blockquote class="note">
+        <p>"The bread...had been collected from local hostels and
+        barracks for pigs."&mdash;<i>Daily Mail</i>.</p>
+    </blockquote>
+
+    <p>Does the writer delicately hesitate to call a sty a sty, or
+    has the internment of the food-hog really begun?</p>
+    <hr />
+
+    <blockquote class="note">
+        <p>"Lord Robert Cecil concluded: 'There is a well-known
+        French proverb, Que; messieurs, les assassins
+        commencement&mdash;let the murderers
+        begin.'"&mdash;<i>Daily News</i>.</p>
+    </blockquote>
+
+    <p>Our contemporary has begun.</p>
+    <hr />
+
+    <h2>REVENTLOW RUMINATES.</h2>
+
+    <div class="poem">
+        <div class="stanza">
+            <p>I have no wounds to show; the cannon's thunder</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">Does not impair my rest. It's just as
+            well,</p>
+
+            <p>For, though I dote on blood, and thoughts of
+            plunder</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">Act on my jaded spirit like a spell,</p>
+
+            <p>I could not but regard it as a blunder</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">If Prussia's foremost scribe should stop
+            a shell.</p>
+        </div>
+
+        <div class="stanza">
+            <p>So, while I sport the usual iron crosses,</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">No feats of valour pinned them on my
+            breast,</p>
+
+            <p>But writing up the sanguinary losses</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">Inflicted by our genius in the West.</p>
+
+            <p>The punctual theme of my Imperial boss is</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">"Turn on a victory!" and I do the
+            rest.</p>
+        </div>
+
+        <div class="stanza">
+            <p>To praise each spasm of ruthlessness that passes</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">Down cringing
+            <span class="sc">Hollweg's</span> compromising
+            spine,</p>
+
+            <p>Boost the pretensions of the ruling classes</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">And hail the Hohenzollerns as divine,</p>
+
+            <p>And never hesitate to tell the masses</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">They are and will continue to be
+            swine:&mdash;</p>
+        </div>
+
+        <div class="stanza">
+            <p>These are my task. And there are compensations</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">About the job that field-grey heroes
+            lack.</p>
+
+            <p>Although, <i>e.g.</i>, there is a dearth of
+            rations,</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">I'm not the one that goes without his
+            whack;</p>
+
+            <p>Nor do the bayonets of inferior nations</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">Send nervous chills down my retreating
+            back.</p>
+        </div>
+
+        <div class="stanza">
+            <p>Yet sometimes in the small and early watches</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">I think, "Good Lord! suppose the U-boats
+            fail!</p>
+
+            <p>Or our Colossus of the purple blotches</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">Should let the Allies get him by the
+            tail!</p>
+
+            <p>Suppose this war is one of Deutschland's
+            botches,</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">And Right, not Might, should happen to
+            prevail!"</p>
+        </div>
+
+        <div class="stanza">
+            <p>There'd be a revolution; nought could stop it.</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">Not that I'd weep if
+            <span class="sc">Wilhelm</span> had to go;</p>
+
+            <p>But what if Holy Junkerdom should cop it?</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">That would be most unfortunate&mdash;and,
+            oh!</p>
+
+            <p>Supposing Count <span class="sc">Reventlow</span>
+            had to hop it,</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">Kultur would never rally from the
+            blow.</p>
+        </div>
+    </div>
+
+    <p class="author">Algol.</p>
+    <hr />
+    <span class="pagenum"><a name="page335" id="page335"></a>[pg
+    335]</span>
+
+    <h3>ROYAL ACADEMY DEPRESSIONS.&mdash;II.</h3>
+
+    <div class="figleft" style="width:45%;">
+        <a href="images/335-1.png"><img width="100%"
+        src="images/335-1.png"
+        alt="'COME ALONG, YOU LITTLE IMP! I'LL LEARN YOU TO MAKE FUN OF MY TROUSERS." />
+        </a>
+
+        <p class="sc">"Come along, you little imp! I'll learn you
+        to make fun of my trousers."</p>
+    </div>
+
+    <div class="figright" style="width:45%;">
+        <a href="images/335-2.png"><img width="100%"
+        src="images/335-2.png" alt="THE ETERNAL FEMININE." /></a>
+
+        <h5>THE ETERNAL FEMININE.</h5>
+
+        <p class="sc">"That'll do; don't trouble about your
+        hair&mdash;we're not likely to meet anyone."</p>
+
+        <p class="sc">"Oh, I can't go like this; one never knows
+        when a submarine may bob up."</p>
+    </div>
+
+    <div class="figleft" style="width:45%;">
+        <a href="images/335-3.png"><img width="100%"
+        src="images/335-3.png"
+        alt="THE FOOD SHORTAGE. ARRIVAL OF THE MINT-SAUCE BOAT." />
+        </a>
+
+        <p class="sc">The food shortage. Arrival of the mint-sauce
+        boat.</p>
+    </div>
+
+    <div class="figright" style="width:45%;">
+        <a href="images/335-4.png"><img width="100%"
+        src="images/335-4.png"
+        alt="'HE CALLS THIS 'THE GARDEN OF MEMORIES,' BUT HE NEARLY FORGOT _ME_.'" />
+        </a>
+
+        <p><i>Figure on the Seat.</i> "<span class="sc">He calls
+        this 'the garden of memories,' but he nearly forgot
+        <i>me</i>.</span>"</p>
+    </div>
+
+    <div class="figleft" style="width:45%;">
+        <a href="images/335-5.png"><img width="100%"
+        src="images/335-5.png"
+        alt="UNHAPPY RESULT OF A TOO GENEROUS FRUIT DIET." /></a>
+
+        <p class="sc">Unhappy result of a too generous fruit
+        diet.</p>
+    </div>
+
+    <div class="figright" style="width:45%;">
+        <a href="images/335-6.png"><img width="100%"
+        src="images/335-6.png" alt="NATIONAL ECONOMY." /></a>
+
+        <h5>NATIONAL ECONOMY.</h5>
+
+        <p class="sc">"Now then, my lads, keep your heads down or
+        we'll have the Frame Controller after us."</p>
+    </div><br clear="all" />
+    <hr />
+    <span class="pagenum"><a name="page336" id="page336"></a>[pg
+    336]</span>
+
+    <div class="figcenter" style="width:100%;">
+        <a href="images/336.png"><img width="100%"
+        src="images/336.png"
+        alt="THE COMPANY WILL MOVE TO THE FIGHT IN ROARS." /></a>
+
+        <p><i>Second-Lieutenant Spooner</i> (<i>unnerved by
+        presence of a General inspecting</i>).
+        "<span class="sc">The Company will move to the fight in
+        roars. Form&mdash;Roars! Fight</span>!"</p>
+    </div>
+    <hr />
+
+    <h2>ZERO.</h2>
+
+    <p class="ctr">("<i>Zero-hour</i>"&mdash;<i>commonly known as
+    "Zero"</i>&mdash;<i>is the hour fixed for the opening of an
+    Infantry attack.</i>)</p>
+
+    <div class="poem">
+        <div class="stanza">
+            <p>I woke at dawn and flung the window wide.</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">Behind the hedge the lazy river ran;</p>
+
+            <p>The dusky barges idled down the tide;</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">In the laburnum-tree the birds began;</p>
+
+            <p>And it was May and half the world in flower;</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">I saw the sun creep over an Eastward
+            brow,</p>
+
+            <p>And thought, "It may be, this is Zero-hour;</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">Somewhere the lads are 'going over'
+            now."</p>
+        </div>
+
+        <div class="stanza">
+            <p>Somewhere the guns speak sudden on the height</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">And build for miles their battlement of
+            fire;</p>
+
+            <p>Somewhere the men that shivered all the night</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">Peer anxious forth and scramble through
+            the wire,</p>
+
+            <p>Swarm slowly out to where the Maxims bark,</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">And green and red the panic rockets
+            rise;</p>
+
+            <p>And Hell is loosed, and shyly sings a lark,</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">And the red sun climbs sadly up the
+            skies.</p>
+        </div>
+
+        <div class="stanza">
+            <p>Now they have won some sepulchred Gavrelle,</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">Some shattered homes in their own dust
+            concealed;</p>
+
+            <p>Now no Bosch troubles them nor any shell,</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">But almost quiet holds the thankful
+            field,</p>
+
+            <p>While men draw breath, and down the Arras road</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">Come the slow mules with battle's dreary
+            stores,</p>
+
+            <p>And there is time to see the wounded stowed,</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">And stretcher-squads besiege the doctors'
+            doors.</p>
+        </div>
+
+        <div class="stanza">
+            <p>Then belches Hell anew. And all day long</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">The afflicted place drifts heavenward in
+            dust;</p>
+
+            <p>All day the shells shriek out their devils'
+            song;</p>
+
+            <p>All day men cling close to the earth's charred
+            crust;</p>
+
+            <p>Till, in the dusk, the Huns come on again,</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">And, like some sluice, the watchers up
+            the hill</p>
+
+            <p>Let loose the guns and flood the soil with
+            slain,</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">And they go back, but scourge the village
+            still.</p>
+        </div>
+
+        <div class="stanza">
+            <p>I see it all. I see the same brave souls</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">To-night, to-morrow, though the half be
+            gone,</p>
+
+            <p>Deafened and dazed, and hunted from their holes,</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">Helpless and hunger-sick, but holding
+            on.</p>
+
+            <p>I shall be happy all the long day here,</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">But not till night shall they go up the
+            steep,</p>
+
+            <p>And, nervous now because the end is near,</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">Totter at last to quietness and to
+            sleep.</p>
+        </div>
+
+        <div class="stanza">
+            <p>And men who find it easier to forget,</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">In England here, among the daffodils,</p>
+
+            <p>That there in France are fields unflowered yet,</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">And murderous May-days on the unlovely
+            hills&mdash;</p>
+
+            <p>Let them go walking where the land is fair</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">And watch the breaking of a morn in
+            May,</p>
+
+            <p>And think, "It may be Zero over there,</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">But here is Peace"&mdash;and kneel
+            awhile, and pray.</p>
+        </div>
+    </div>
+    <hr />
+
+    <blockquote class="note">
+        <p>"Surely one result of the war will be that civilised
+        races will regard the German as an outcast unfit to
+        associate with or to have dealings with on equal terms. If
+        he is able to say 'tu grogue' we shall put ourselves in a
+        false position."&mdash;<i>Times of India</i>.</p>
+    </blockquote>
+
+    <p>For ourselves, we decline to do this. We shall simply call
+    him another.</p>
+    <hr />
+    <span class="pagenum"><a name="page337" id="page337"></a>[pg
+    337]</span>
+
+    <div class="figcenter" style="width:100%;">
+        <a href="images/337.png"><img width="60%"
+        src="images/337.png" alt="FOR SERVICES RENDERED." /></a>
+
+        <h3>FOR SERVICES RENDERED.</h3>A GERMAN DECORATION FOR
+        BRITISH STRIKERS.
+    </div>
+    <hr />
+    <span class="pagenum"><a name="page338" id="page338"></a>[pg
+    338]</span>
+
+    <h2>ESSENCE OF PARLIAMENT.</h2>
+
+    <div class="figcenter" style="width:100%;">
+        <a href="images/338.png"><img width="100%"
+        src="images/338.png"
+        alt="Our racing correspondent writes that Mr. LLOYD GEORGE is having some difficulty with his string" />
+        </a>
+
+        <p>Our racing correspondent writes that Mr.
+        <span class="sc">Lloyd George</span> is having some
+        difficulty with his string (Sinn Fein's Beauty
+        <span class="sc">Ginnell</span>, All and More for Ireland
+        <span class="sc">Redmond</span>, and Ulster
+        <span class="sc">Carson</span>) for the Irish Grand
+        National.</p>
+    </div>
+
+    <p><i>Monday, May 14th</i>.&mdash;No longer will the
+    <span class="sc">First Sea Lord</span> be distracted from his
+    primary duty of strafing the Hun by the necessity of looking
+    after supplies. That function will now be discharged by an hon.
+    and temp. Vice-Admiral, in the person of Sir
+    <span class="sc">Eric Geddes</span>, late hon. and temp.
+    Major-General and Director of Transportation to the Army in
+    France, and now Shipbuilder-in-Chief to the nation. Everyone
+    seemed pleased, with the notable exception of Mr.
+    <span class="sc">Hogge</span>, who cannot understand why all
+    these appointments should be showered upon Sir
+    <span class="sc">Eric Geddes</span>, when there are other able
+    Scotsmen still unemployed. A late hon. Admiral of the Fleet,
+    now residing at Potsdam, is believed to share Mr.
+    <span class="sc">Hogge's</span> objections.</p>
+
+    <p>The hardships endured by the criminal classes when they are
+    so unfortunate as to get into prison always strikes a
+    sympathetic chord in the gentle breast of Mr.
+    <span class="sc">Edmund Harvey</span>. His latest discovery is
+    that they are allowed the use of writing-paper not more than
+    once a month; and for the rest of the time have to entrust
+    their literary compositions to the unsympathetic surface of a
+    slate, with the aid of a probably squeaky slate-pencil. Could
+    <span class="sc">John Bunyan</span> have written <i>The
+    Pilgrim's Progress</i> under such conditions? The question
+    opens up a vista of speculation as to the influence of
+    environment upon the creative faculty; and it is not surprising
+    that Mr. <span class="sc">Brace</span> was unable to answer it
+    offhand.</p>
+
+    <p>In ordinary times the Financial Secretary of the Treasury is
+    the most important Member of the Government outside the
+    Cabinet. Under the present <i>régime</i> he is not a member of
+    the House at all. It is true that Mr.
+    <span class="sc">Baldwin</span> takes his place as
+    Parliamentary whipping-boy to the <span class="sc">Chancellor
+    of the Exchequer</span> with much grace and good humour; but
+    that does not satisfy hon. Members, who want a more substantial
+    object for their daily castigation. The debate on this subject
+    revealed a sharp division of opinion between Mr.
+    <span class="sc">Edwin Montagu</span> and Mr.
+    <span class="sc">Herbert Samuel</span>. <span class="sc">Cousin
+    Edwin</span>, as an ex-Secretary of the Treasury, did not think
+    the House had suffered any serious loss through being unable to
+    cross-examine that official direct. <span class="sc">Cousin
+    Herbert</span> was shocked at this revolutionary sentiment
+    coming from his kinsman. If it were accepted there was no
+    logical reason why even the Chancellor of the Exchequer should
+    have a seat in the House. Why, indeed, have Ministers at all? A
+    row of gramophones, ranged along the Treasury Bench and
+    supplied with officially prepared records, would satisfy all
+    legitimate curiosity.</p>
+
+    <p><i>Tuesday, May 15th</i>.&mdash;I forget how many weeks ago
+    it is since Mr. <span class="sc">Bonar Law</span> announced
+    that the Government were going to make one more effort to
+    settle the Irish Question, and that in due course the
+    <span class="sc">Prime Minister</span> would announce their
+    proposals. Since then events have conspired to produce
+    successive postponements. Mr. <span class="sc">Lloyd
+    George</span> had to go to France&mdash;for the War refuses to
+    stop even though Irishmen decline to encourage it&mdash;Mr.
+    <span class="sc">Redmond</span> fell ill, Archbishop
+    <span class="sc">Walsh</span> indited a postscript, and an
+    election in South Longford suggested doubts as to whether
+    Nationalist M.P.'s were really the Irish nation after all.
+    Nevertheless there is a plan; and it is to be communicated, but
+    in the first instance to the leaders of Irish parties only, and
+    then, if they please, to the Press, and finally, perhaps, to
+    the House of Commons.</p>
+
+    <p><i>Wednesday, May 16th</i>.&mdash;We all want to help the
+    new Russian Government in its difficult task, but I doubt if
+    Mr. <span class="sc">Snowden</span> and his pacifist friends
+    have contributed to that end by inviting the House of Commons
+    to endorse forthwith the "no annexation, no indemnities"
+    declaration of a section of the
+    <span class="pagenum"><a name="page339" id="page339"></a>[pg
+    339]</span> Revolutionaries, and by supporting their proposal
+    in a series of speeches which might be summed up in the words
+    "Peace at any Price." Even the German
+    <span class="sc">Chancellor</span> will not be wholly pleased,
+    for the debate revealed that, apart from the seven or eight
+    gentlemen who follow the white flag of the Member for
+    Blackburn, the House is absolutely fixed in its determination
+    to defeat German militarism before talking of peace.</p>
+
+    <p>After the searching analysis to which the hon. Member's
+    confident statements were subjected by Lord
+    <span class="sc">Robert Cecil</span> and Mr. A.F.
+    <span class="sc">Whyte</span> there was nothing left of them
+    but a trace of acid.</p>
+
+    <p>So far as I am aware the Member for Blackburn has never
+    endangered the integrity of his principles by helping his
+    country in any way to win the War. In this respect Mr.
+    <span class="sc">Lees Smith</span>, who seconded the motion,
+    has a less consistent record, for he has worn khaki as an
+    orderly of the R.A.M.C. But in his case service abroad seems
+    only to have confirmed his peculiar principles, for he thinks
+    that we ought to return the German colonies, and enable the
+    natives to enjoy once again the blessings of <i>Kultur</i>. If
+    he ever saw the Hun while he was in France it must have been
+    through a pair of rose-tinted binoculars.</p>
+
+    <p><i>Thursday, May 17th</i>.&mdash;We are all agog to know
+    whether the <span class="sc">Prime Minister's</span> offer of
+    immediate Home Rule to twenty-six Counties of Ireland is to be
+    blessed or banned by the Nationalists. This is the day when
+    Irish Questions have priority, and the House hears such
+    important inquiries as whether Hibernian holiday-makers will
+    have their excursion-trains restored to them; what became of a
+    side of bacon captured by the police during the Easter Monday
+    rebellion, and why a certain magistrate should have been struck
+    off the Commission of the Peace for a trifling refusal to take
+    the oath of allegiance. Are we to go without this entertainment
+    in the future, or will Mr. <span class="sc">Redmond</span>
+    refuse to rob Westminster of its gaiety even for the sake of
+    College Green?</p>
+
+    <p>If, as I ventured to suggest last week, the
+    <span class="sc">Chancellor of the Exchequer</span> had laid in
+    a stock of tobacco before the Budget he has evidently exhausted
+    it by now, for, on his attention again being called to the
+    exorbitant charge of the tobacconists, he no longer pooh-poohed
+    the matter, but sternly declared that the situation was being
+    closely watched.</p>
+    <hr />
+
+    <blockquote class="note">
+        <h4>Commercial Candour.</h4>
+
+        <p>"The Car that never fails to give anything but
+        satisfaction to its owners."&mdash;<i>Advertisement in
+        "Indian Motor News."</i></p>
+    </blockquote>
+    <hr />
+
+    <div class="figcenter" style="width:65%;">
+        <a href="images/339.png"><img width="100%"
+        src="images/339.png" alt="A-ARE YOU NERVOUS, OLD CHAP?" />
+        </a>
+
+        <p><i>Amateur</i> (<i>awaiting his turn to perform</i>).
+        "<span class="sc">A-are you nervous, old chap</span>?"</p>
+
+        <p><i>Infant Prodigy</i> (<i>ditto</i>).
+        "<span class="sc">What is 'nervous</span>'?"</p>
+    </div>
+    <hr />
+
+    <h3>MY AMERICAN COUSINS.</h3>
+
+    <div class="poem">
+        <div class="stanza">
+            <p>Because they speak the tongue that's mine,</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">Rich in the treasure that belongs</p>
+
+            <p>To them as well as me, and twine</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">Their heart-strings in our English
+            songs,</p>
+
+            <p>I knew they'd scorn those German threats</p>
+
+            <p class="i8">And sham regrets.</p>
+        </div>
+
+        <div class="stanza">
+            <p>Because their country's name is scrolled</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">With Liberty's; because her fate,</p>
+
+            <p>Like England's own, must be unrolled</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">In Freedom still, they had to hate</p>
+
+            <p>The thought of bowing down before</p>
+
+            <p class="i8">A Lord of War.</p>
+        </div>
+
+        <div class="stanza">
+            <p>And now they'll lavish in the strife</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">The gold they've scorned to love too
+            well,</p>
+
+            <p>And fleets to bring the food that's life,</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">And guns of death, and steel and
+            shell;</p>
+
+            <p>Defeat or triumph, stand or fall,</p>
+
+            <p class="i8">They'll share their all.</p>
+        </div>
+
+        <div class="stanza">
+            <p>They're out for business; now's their Day;</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">They took their time, but finished
+            right;</p>
+
+            <p>The heat got slowly comes to stay;</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">Patient for peace means firm in
+            fight;</p>
+
+            <p>And so their country still shall be</p>
+
+            <p class="i8">Land of the Free.</p>
+        </div>
+    </div>
+    <hr />
+
+    <blockquote class="note">
+        <p>"Remarkable scenes were witnessed at Exeter yesterday at
+        the free distribution of 10,000 lbs. of potatoes in 5 lb.
+        lots. Five thousand people obtained 5 lbs.
+        each."&mdash;<i>Sunday Paper</i>.</p>
+    </blockquote>
+
+    <p>This result was obtained by the forethought of the
+    distributors, who had the potatoes laid out on multiplication
+    tables.</p>
+    <hr />
+    <span class="pagenum"><a name="page340" id="page340"></a>[pg
+    340]</span>
+
+    <div class="figcenter" style="width:100%;">
+        <a href="images/340.png"><img width="100%"
+        src="images/340.png"
+        alt="WHAT THE BLAZES ARE YOU DOING? AND WITH THEM 'ORSES STANDIN' HIDLE?" />
+        </a>
+
+        <p><i>Farmer</i>. "<span class="sc">What the blazes are you
+        doing? And with them 'orses standin' hidle</span>?"</p>
+
+        <p><i>Tommy</i>. "<span class="sc">Cleanin' me buttons.
+        'Aven't you never been a soldier</span>?"</p>
+    </div>
+    <hr />
+
+    <h2>THE DOLLS THAT DID THEIR BIT.</h2>
+
+    <p><i>"Je vous tends mon corbillon: qu'y met-on?"</i> asked
+    Jeanne, holding out her basket towards the first of her dolls
+    seated in a semi-circle before her. Most of them were quite
+    familiar with the game, but for the sake of a new-comer Jeanne
+    had explained that each player must place in the basket some
+    object the name of which ended with <i>on</i>, to rhyme with
+    <i>corbillon</i>. She had announced that this time the game was
+    in aid of a cause, and that therefore it must be played with
+    <i>things</i> and not with words only.</p>
+
+    <p>"Qu'y met-on, Marie?" repeated Jeanne. "Rappelez-vous bien
+    que c'est une quête à l'intention des petites filles polonaises
+    internées au camp de Havelberg!" What, Marie had nothing but
+    her chain necklace, and that did not end in <i>on?</i> No, but
+    the links of the chain did, argued Jeanne. "Donne <i>des
+    chaînons!</i>" she prompted in a whisper. "J'y mets des
+    chaînons," said Marie in Jeanne's thinnest voice, and the
+    necklace found its way into the basket.</p>
+
+    <p>"<i>Je vous tends mon corbillon: qu'y met-on?</i> À vous,
+    Marthe. Ô," exclaimed Jeanne, "tu y mets ton <i>chignon?</i> Eh
+    bien, tu sais, n'est-ce pas, bêta, qu'il faut que tu t'y mettes
+    avec!" and into the basket she went after a lingering caress
+    from Jeanne.</p>
+
+    <p><i>"Je vous tends mon corbillon: qu'y met-on?"</i> It was
+    the turn now of Yvonne in her bed. "Comment," said Jeanne,
+    affecting indignation, "si tu n'étais pas si frileuse tu
+    donnerais ton édredon?" And what about the little <i>poupées
+    polonaises internées</i>, snatched from their beds and carried
+    off without any bedclothes at all, let alone an eiderdown!
+    Presently, "J'y mets mon édredon," Yvonne was understood to
+    say, and "Sage!" approved Jeanne.</p>
+
+    <p><i>"Je vous tends mon corbillon: qu'y met-on?</i> Jacques,
+    mon pauvre ami, tu n'as pas de chance, hein?" There was no help
+    for it; it was the only thing he had that rhymed. "Imagine la
+    joie des petites polonaises internées!" she urged, taking the
+    necessary action. "J'y mets mon pantalon," piped a disconsolate
+    little thread of voice.</p>
+
+    <p><i>"Je vous tends mon corbillon: qu'y met-on?</i> A vous,
+    Mikadesse!" A beam of pleasure, succeeded by a falling of the
+    countenance, then a look of decision, ended in a "Houp-là!" as
+    the Japanese doll descended into the basket, and was made to
+    say, "J'y mets une poupée du Japon!" After all she was an ally
+    of the little polonaises.</p>
+
+    <p><i>"Je vous tends mon corbillon: qu'y met-on?</i> Allons,
+    les jumeaux! à vous!" Jeanne thought the twins were really in a
+    plight and that she would have to help them out with a gift,
+    but, quick as thought, Castor seized Pollux, saying, "J'y mets
+    mon compagnon!" and Pollux, divining his intention, grasped
+    Castor, declaring excitedly, "Et moi aussi, j'y mets mon
+    compagnon" And into the basket they leapt together. "Ils
+    s'entêtent à rester inséparables," sighed Jeanne; "c'est
+    bien."</p>
+
+    <p><i>"Je vous tends mon corbillon: qu'y met-on?"</i> Adélaïde
+    never had possessed anything worth giving away, and yet she
+    seemed to be suggesting that the contents of the basket did not
+    look very imposing so far, and would hardly be enough to go
+    round among so many little Poles, so Jeanne came to the rescue
+    with gifts of toys until "J'y mets ma contribution!" came
+    jubilantly forth in a voice that forgot to be Adélaïde's.</p>
+
+    <p>All had now contributed. Yet Jeanne had a feeling that
+    somehow it was not the end of the game. She pondered gravely
+    for a few moments, then, placing herself solemnly before the
+    mirror, she addressed herself:&mdash;</p>
+
+    <p><i>"Jeanne, je vous tends mon corbillon: qu'y met-on?"</i>
+    After a few seconds she began to see what she ought to do.</p>
+
+    <p>"Qu'y mets-tu, Jeanne?" It would be rather hard, but she
+    must do it.</p>
+
+    <p>Sitting down and turning up the skirt of her frock, she took
+    each of the <span class="pagenum"><a name="page341"
+    id="page341"></a>[pg 341]</span> contributors, kissed and
+    caressed them, and placed them in her lap. Adélaïde only did
+    she except, explaining to the others, "Oui, mes chéris, je
+    garde Adélaïde, car savez-vous bien, c'est elle qui me donne
+    des idées; je prends toujours conseil avec elle. Alors, n'est
+    ce pas?" Then, carrying the dolls in her petticoat, she
+    solemnly undid the button, let it slip down with the dolls
+    inside, and placed it resolutely in the basket, saying: "J'y
+    mets mon jupon!"</p>
+
+    <p>What was Adélaïde saying? One must give cheerfully and not
+    regret the gift? <i>Surtout il ne faut pas verser une
+    larme!</i></p>
+
+    <p>So, hugging her doll, Jeanne returned to the mirror and
+    added, smiling, "Avec sa-tis-fac-ti-on!"</p>
+    <hr />
+
+    <div class="figcenter" style="width:100%;">
+        <a href="images/341.png"><img width="100%"
+        src="images/341.png"
+        alt="I 'EARD THE GUVNOR SAY THERE WAS THREE 'UNDRED QUID REFUSED FOR 'IM BEFORE THE WAR. WHAT DO YOU THINK OF THAT?" />
+        </a>
+
+        <p><i>Officer's Servant</i> (<i>replying to adverse
+        criticism of war-worn charger</i>). "<span class="sc">I
+        'eard the guvnor say there was three 'undred quid refused
+        for 'im before the War. What do you think of
+        that</span>?"</p>
+
+        <p><i>Jock</i>. "<span class="sc">Weel, I'm thenkin' there
+        was twa fools met that day, and i dinna ken which o' them
+        was the bigger</span>."</p>
+    </div>
+    <hr />
+
+    <blockquote class="note">
+        <p class="ctr">"Prospects in English Literature.<br />
+        III.&mdash;Looking Backward."&mdash;<i>The
+        Athenæum</i>.</p>
+    </blockquote>
+
+    <p>We trust this is only preliminary to a further advance.</p>
+    <hr />
+
+    <blockquote class="note">
+        <p>"Shepherds in Scotland are feeding lambs with whisky and
+        hot milk. Many titled landed proprietors are acting as
+        shepherds."&mdash;<i>Daily News</i>.</p>
+    </blockquote>
+
+    <p>Surely our Radical contemporary does not mean to
+    suggest&mdash;</p>
+    <hr />
+
+    <h3>FAIRIES.</h3>
+
+    <div class="poem">
+        <div class="stanza">
+            <p>There are fairies at the bottom of our garden!</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">It's not so very, very far away;</p>
+
+            <p>You pass the gardener's shed and you just keep
+            straight ahead;</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">I do so hope they've really come to
+            stay.</p>
+
+            <p>There's a little wood, with moss in it and
+            beetles,</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">And a little stream that quietly runs
+            through;</p>
+
+            <p>You wouldn't think they'd dare to come merrymaking
+            there&mdash;</p>
+
+            <p class="i10">Well, they do.</p>
+        </div>
+
+        <div class="stanza">
+            <p>There are fairies at the bottom of our garden!</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">They often have a dance on summer
+            nights;</p>
+
+            <p>The butterflies and bees make a lovely little
+            breeze,</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">And the rabbits stand about and hold the
+            lights.</p>
+
+            <p>Did you know that they could sit upon the
+            moonbeams</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">And pick a little star to make a fan,</p>
+
+            <p>And dance away up there in the middle of the
+            air?</p>
+
+            <p class="i10">Well, they can.</p>
+        </div>
+
+        <div class="stanza">
+            <p>There are fairies at the bottom of our garden!</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">You cannot think how beautiful they
+            are;</p>
+
+            <p>They all stand up and sing when the Fairy Queen and
+            King</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">Come gently floating down upon their
+            car.</p>
+
+            <p>The King is very proud and <i>very</i> handsome;</p>
+
+            <p class="i2">The Queen&mdash;now can you guess who
+            that could be</p>
+
+            <p>(She's a little girl all day, but at night she
+            steals away)?&mdash;</p>
+
+            <p class="i10">Well&mdash;it's
+            <span class="sc">Me</span>!</p>
+        </div>
+    </div>
+    <hr />
+
+    <blockquote class="note">
+        <p>"Young Lady Wanted, for few months, as Companion-Help
+        (seaside); fare paid and 6d. week pocket-money; or would
+        train Girl as Housemaid, same terms."&mdash;<i>Provincial
+        Paper</i>.</p>
+    </blockquote>
+
+    <p>Such extravagance in war-time ought to be checked.</p>
+    <hr />
+
+    <blockquote class="note">
+        <p class="ctr">"<span class="sc">Shady German
+        Trick</span>.</p>
+
+        <p>"In the village of Boisleux-au-Mout the Germans utilised
+        part of the cemetery to bury their own dead, but before
+        doing so deliberately hewed down every tree growing on the
+        side of the ground where the French graves
+        lie."&mdash;<i>Daily Paper</i>.</p>
+    </blockquote>
+
+    <p>Is "shady" quite the right word for this outrage?</p>
+    <hr />
+    <span class="pagenum"><a name="page342" id="page342"></a>[pg
+    342]</span>
+
+    <h2>PEAS AND PLEDGES.</h2>
+
+    <p>"Has anything special," I said, "been happening during my
+    absence?"</p>
+
+    <p>"We are up to our chins in work," said Francesca.</p>
+
+    <p>"But is it real work?"</p>
+
+    <p>"Of course it is. We've formed a General Committee, of which
+    everybody's a member, including you, and we've formed an
+    Executive Committee, of which there are about a dozen members.
+    And then there are some Sub-Committees."</p>
+
+    <p>"Yes, I know. The Executive Committee thinks it's going to
+    do all the work, but it's got to report to the General
+    Committee, and it it'll be a great piece of luck if the General
+    Committee doesn't insist on asserting itself by upsetting all
+    the decisions of the Executive Committee."</p>
+
+    <p>"Oh, but our General Committee isn't going to be like that
+    at all. There won't be any petty jealousy about our General
+    Committee. Besides, the Executive Committee has power to act,
+    and it doesn't need to report till the Annual Meeting of the
+    General Committee, which is to be held a year from now. When
+    that time comes lots of things will have happened."</p>
+
+    <p>"That," I said, "is one of the truest things you've ever
+    said. Even the War may be over by that time."</p>
+
+    <p>"But if it isn't we shall all be living on swedes or
+    pea-soup, or rice-bread or all three together; and we shall
+    have a food controller in every village, and our Committees
+    won't be wanted."</p>
+
+    <p>"I beg your pardon; they'll be more wanted than ever to keep
+    the controller straight and act as a buffer between him and the
+    population."</p>
+
+    <p>"But they won't know they're a buffer, and they won't like
+    it when some tactless person tells them. Anyhow, that's a long
+    way off, and in the meantime we've got the land."</p>
+
+    <p>"Who've got what land?"</p>
+
+    <p>"Our Committee," said Francesca, "have got two acres of land
+    from Mr. Carberry, and we're going to grow a crop of peas on it
+    so that everybody may have pea-soup in case of a pinch."</p>
+
+    <p>"But what about the peas?" I said, "Have you made sure of
+    those?"</p>
+
+    <p>"We had a good deal of trouble about them, but we've got a
+    firm promise of six bushels."</p>
+
+    <p>"Capital! But are you quite sure you know how to bring the
+    land and the peas together?"</p>
+
+    <p>"Well, I'm not so much of an expert as I should like to be,
+    but Mr. Bolton 's a practical farmer, and he's going to do all
+    he can for us."</p>
+
+    <p>"Will he plough it?"</p>
+
+    <p>"It's been ploughed twice, so he's undertaken to harrow it
+    and scarify it&mdash;doesn't it sound awful?&mdash;and then
+    something else is going to happen to it, but I forget what it's
+    called."</p>
+
+    <p>"Wouldn't it be a good thing, at some stage or other, to
+    plant the peas?"</p>
+
+    <p>"Yes, it would; but you can't do it as simply as all that,
+    can you? Isn't there something highly agricultural that you
+    must do first?"</p>
+
+    <p>"I should chuck 'em in and chance it."</p>
+
+    <p>"A nice farmer you'd make," she said scornfully. "I'm
+    remembering it now. It's got something to do with drills."</p>
+
+    <p>"Like the Volunteers?"</p>
+
+    <p>"No, not a bit like the Volunteers."</p>
+
+    <p>"Well, then, like potatoes."</p>
+
+    <p>"Yes, more like potatoes, except that they're peas in this
+    case."</p>
+
+    <p>"How true," I said.</p>
+
+    <p>"Yes. And don't forget that while you were away we formed a
+    League of Honour in the village and bound ourselves to observe
+    the <span class="sc">Food Controller's</span> rations."</p>
+
+    <p>"Am I a member?"</p>
+
+    <p>"Yes, we thought you'd like to be one, so I gave your name
+    in."</p>
+
+    <p>"I think a man must pledge his own honour. He can't have it
+    done for him."</p>
+
+    <p>"There's no public ceremony. You can just pledge yourself in
+    your mind, and then put a pledge card in one of the
+    windows."</p>
+
+    <p>"I'll have tea first," I said, "and then I'll choose the
+    window, and then I'll pledge myself in my mind."</p>
+
+    <p>"No, you can do the pledging now."</p>
+
+    <p>"I've done it, while you were talking."</p>
+
+    <p>"And after all it's only the old rations according to Lord
+    <span class="sc">Devonport</span>, and we've been working under
+    them for some time now."</p>
+
+    <p>"So we have," I said; "but of course the card in the window
+    makes all the difference."</p>
+
+    <p class="author">R.C.L.</p>
+    <hr />
+
+    <div class="figcenter" style="width:50%;">
+        <a href="images/342.png"><img width="100%"
+        src="images/342.png" alt="THE SERVANT PROBLEM." /></a>
+
+        <h5>THE SERVANT PROBLEM.</h5>
+
+        <p><i>Lady</i>. "<span class="sc">And why did your last
+        mistress</span>&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+        <p><i>Applicant</i> (<i>loftily</i>).
+        "<span class="sc">Excuse me, Madam</span>!"</p>
+
+        <p><i>Lady</i>. "<span class="sc">Well&mdash;er&mdash;your
+        last employer</span>&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+        <p><i>Applicant</i>. "<span class="sc">I beg your pardon,
+        Madam</span>!"</p>
+
+        <p><i>Lady</i>. "<span class="sc">Well, then, your
+        last&mdash;er&mdash;pray what do you call those in whose
+        service you are engaged</span>?"</p>
+
+        <p><i>Applicant</i>. "<span class="sc">Clients,
+        Madam</span>." [<i>Collapse of interrogator</i>.]</p>
+    </div>
+    <hr />
+
+    <blockquote class="note">
+        <h4>Our Modest Contemporaries.</h4>
+
+        <p>"Had it been intended to make any new pronouncement of
+        importance the Berlin Government would have taken steps to
+        circulate the speech by wireless in time for publication in
+        'The Star' yesterday evening."&mdash;<i>The Star</i>.</p>
+    </blockquote>
+
+    <p>It is possible that Dr.
+    <span class="sc">Bethmann-Hollweg</span> was misled by our
+    contemporary's habit of publishing its "7.0 Edition" at
+    4.30.</p>
+    <hr />
+
+    <p>From an obituary notice:&mdash;</p>
+
+    <blockquote>
+        <p>"He had studied Eastern religions, and claimed to have
+        been initiated as a llama of Tibet."&mdash;<i>Daily
+        Mail</i>.</p>
+    </blockquote>
+
+    <p>Or should it be the Grand Lama of Peru?</p>
+    <hr />
+
+    <blockquote>
+        <p>"The &mdash;&mdash; Food Economy Committee were
+        astounded yesterday at the secretary's report of a
+        collier's family of six persons who consumed twenty
+        half-quartern loaves in one week, averaging twenty pounds
+        of bread per person."&mdash;<i>Sunday Chronicle</i>.</p>
+    </blockquote>
+
+    <p>It is not stated whether the astonishment was caused by the
+    family's appetite or the secretary's arithmetic.</p>
+    <hr />
+    <span class="pagenum"><a name="page343" id="page343"></a>[pg
+    343]</span>
+
+    <div class="figcenter" style="width:100%;">
+        <a href="images/343.png"><img width="100%"
+        src="images/343.png"
+        alt="'OUR CAPTAIN IS ONE OF THE BEST, AND WE'RE READY TO FOLLOW HIM TO H--L.' I SUPPOSE HE MEANS THE HINDENBURG LINE." />
+        </a>
+
+        <p><i>Fond Mother</i> (<i>reading</i>).
+        "'<span class="sc">Our captain is one of the best, and
+        we're ready to follow him to h&mdash;l.' I suppose he means
+        the Hindenburg Line.</span>"</p>
+    </div>
+    <hr />
+
+    <h2>OUR BOOKING-OFFICE.</h2>
+
+    <p class="ctr">(<i>By Mr. Punch's Staff of Learned
+    Clerks</i>.)</p>
+
+    <p>In the list of heroic young soldier-authors whose gifts the
+    War has revealed to us only to snatch them away, the name of
+    <span class="sc">Donald Hankey</span> already holds an honoured
+    place. It will, therefore, be good news to the many admirers of
+    <i>A Student in Arms</i> that a further selection of these
+    heartening and fine-spirited papers has been prepared under the
+    title of <i>A Student in Arms&mdash;Second Series</i>
+    (<span class="sc">Melrose</span>). The thousands who already
+    know and admire Lieut. <span class="sc">Hankey's</span> work
+    will need no introduction to this, which exhibits all the
+    qualities of courage and sympathy that have given the former
+    book a world-wide popularity. They, and others, will however
+    welcome the occasion afforded here of learning something about
+    the life and personality of the writer, which they will do both
+    from the short preface contributed by one whose identity is
+    hardly disguised under the initials "H.M.A.H.," and from a
+    couple of papers, autobiographical, that end the volume.
+    Rugbieans especially will be interested to read
+    <span class="sc">Donald Hankey's</span> recollections of his
+    school-days, with their tribute to the house-master
+    affectionately known to so many generations as "Jackey." A
+    book, in short, that will add to the admiration and regret with
+    which its author is spoken of in three continents.</p>
+    <hr class="short" />
+
+    <p><i>He Looked in My Window</i> (<span class="sc">Chatto And
+    Windus</span>), by <span class="sc">Robert Halifax</span>,
+    gives the adventures of <i>Ruth Shadd</i>, decentest of
+    dwellers in a meanish street, during her determined hunt for a
+    husband. It would have been easy to make all this unlovely in
+    its frankness, but the author very skilfully (and, I think,
+    very sincerely) avoids this. <i>Ruth</i> is a fine girl, with
+    character and candour, those too rare assets, and having
+    pursued, and found wanting, <i>Bert</i>, the swanker, who
+    hasn't the courage for matrimony; the polite and fatuously
+    prudent <i>Archie</i>, and <i>Joe</i>, the vegetarian, who had
+    such exalted faith in malt, she wins a deserved happiness with
+    someone that she had never even thought of pursuing. Mr.
+    <span class="sc">Halifax</span> gives me an impression of
+    almost cinematographic and gramophonic exactness in his
+    portraiture. <i>George Shadd</i>, <i>Ruth's</i> father, who
+    worked in the gasworks and was one of the very best, delighted
+    me particularly, with his pathetic little garden, his battle
+    with the slugs and black-fly, and his fine patience with
+    <i>Mrs. Shadd</i>, who put her washing before his fire and her
+    props among his choicest seedlings&mdash;a difficult woman
+    indeed. The author writes with humour and sympathy; and that is
+    the way to write of this brave if narrow life. It is the first
+    time I have looked in Mr. <span class="sc">Halifax's</span>
+    window. I shall take steps to do so again. 'Tis a nice clean
+    window.</p>
+    <hr class="short" />
+
+    <p>Not even the most confirmed Gallio can avoid caring for
+    <i>Arthur Stanton&mdash;A Memoir</i>, by the Rt. Hon. G.W.E.
+    <span class="sc">Russell (Longmans)</span>, when he has once
+    dipped his mind into the book. It is the record of a singularly
+    beautiful and beneficent life, lived to the very utmost in the
+    service of God and man, and ruled by a simple and direct
+    religion which constantly forced practice up to the exalted
+    level of precept. Judged by merely worldly standards of
+    achievement, <span class="sc">Arthur Stanton's</span> life
+    could not be considered a success. He began as curate of St.
+    Alban's, Holborn, and as curate of St. Alban's he ended after
+    many years of enthusiastic devotion to humanity. He was foiled
+    and thwarted by the great ones of the Church, inhibited in one
+    <span class="pagenum"><a name="page344" id="page344"></a>[pg
+    344]</span> place, suspended in another, and frequently doomed
+    to find a Bishop or a Chaplain-General set, like a lion, across
+    his path. But nothing could avail to stop him where he found a
+    soul that could be saved or misery that could be relieved. His
+    congregation, drawn from the slums of Holborn, would have died
+    for him to a man, for they realised with how great an ardour
+    his life was spent in order that he might help them. His faith
+    was not a mystery kept apart for special occasions, but a daily
+    and hourly influence vivifying his words and directing his
+    actions. And no man could have enjoyed himself more than this
+    true saint and interpreter of God to man. His religion was not
+    one of gloom and foreboding, but a cheerful and delightful
+    habit of mind and soul. <i>Tantum religio potuit suadere
+    bonorum.</i> Mr. <span class="sc">Russell</span> has done his
+    work with great skill and perfect sympathy, and has produced a
+    book that does honour to himself and to the beloved friend whom
+    it is his privilege to commemorate.</p>
+    <hr class="short" />
+
+    <p>The many readers of <i>Punch</i> who took a close interest
+    in <span class="sc">Alec Johnston's</span> letters written "At
+    the Back of the Front" and "At the Front" will be glad to have
+    them in collected form. The memory of his gallant end&mdash;he
+    was killed in action after the brilliant capture of a salient
+    near Ypres, at the head of his company of Shropshires&mdash;is
+    fresh in all our hearts. A preface to <i>At the Front</i>
+    (<span class="sc">Constable</span>) contains an appreciation of
+    his high character and soldierly qualities by his friend and
+    fellow-officer, Captain <span class="sc">Ingram</span>,
+    R.A.M.C., D.S.O., M.C., who a few weeks later was himself
+    killed. It is a fine tribute paid by one true soldier to
+    another. These letters of <span class="sc">Alec
+    Johnston</span>, as their editor reminds us, "were composed in
+    the brief interludes snatched from hard fighting and hard
+    fatigues. They never pretended to be more than the gay and
+    cynical banter of one who brought to the perils of life at the
+    Front an incurable habit of humour. They are typical of that
+    brave spirit, essentially English, that makes light of the
+    worst that fate can send."</p>
+    <hr class="short" />
+
+    <p>It must, I should think, be exceedingly difficult to find a
+    new title in these days for a volume of reminiscences. Mr.
+    <span class="sc">Raymond Blathwayt</span> seems to have solved
+    the problem happily enough by calling his contribution to the
+    rapidly-increasing library of recollections, <i>Through Life
+    and Round the World</i> (<span class="sc">Allen</span>). One
+    way and another, first as a curate (rightly termed by the
+    publishers "rather unconventional"), later as journalist, Mr.
+    <span class="sc">Blathwayt</span> has contrived to use a pair
+    of remarkably open eyes with excellent effect. The result is
+    this fat volume, whose contents, if honesty constrains me to
+    call the most of them gossip, are at least generally
+    entertaining and never ill-natured. Needless to say, Mr.
+    <span class="sc">Blathwayt</span>, like the elder
+    <i>Capulet</i>, can "tell a tale such as will please." For
+    myself, out of a goodly store, I should select for first
+    honours a repartee, new to me, of Sir <span class="sc">Herbert
+    Tree</span> (forgive this dropping into rhyme!). It tells of a
+    boastful old-time actor, vaunting his triumphs as
+    <i>Hamlet</i>, when "the audience took fifteen minutes leaving
+    the theatre." "<i>Was ha lame?</i>" If our only
+    <span class="sc">Herbert</span> did not in fact make this
+    reply, I can only hope that he will at once hasten home and do
+    so. But while we are upon Mr.
+    <span class="sc">Blathwayt's</span> dramatic recollections, I
+    must respectfully traverse his dictum that some of the acting
+    at the local pageants of a few years back "surpassed the very
+    best I have seen upon the stage." As one who took a personal
+    part in many of those well-meant revivals, and dates a relaxed
+    throat from the effort of vociferating history, up-wind,
+    towards a stand full of ear-straining auditors, I bow but
+    remain unconvinced.</p>
+    <hr class="short" />
+
+    <p>Although the literary style of Mr. <span class="sc">Julius
+    M. Price</span>, of <i>The Illustrated London News</i>, is too
+    breezy for my taste, I am glad to have read his <i>Six Months
+    on the Italian Front</i> (<span class="sc">Chapman and
+    Hall</span>). Possibly he under-estimates our appreciation of
+    Italy's share in the War's burden, but his account of the
+    conditions prevailing upon the Italian front, and of the
+    courage and skill with which they have been overcome, deserves
+    our undiluted approval. It is difficult to believe that anyone
+    who is not at least a member of the Alpine Club can dimly
+    realise the engineering feats which the Italian soldiers have
+    performed. Mr. <span class="sc">Price</span> has been given
+    many opportunities of observation, and where none was given to
+    him he has contrived to make them for himself. And the result
+    is a book full of incident and excitement. I hope that he will
+    pardon me when I add that my sense of gratitude would have been
+    greater if, in addition to the photograph of himself&mdash;or
+    even instead of it&mdash;he had given us a map. For the rest
+    his illustrations are excellent.</p>
+    <hr class="short" />
+
+    <p>To <span class="sc">Martin Swayne</span>, officer in the
+    R.A.M.C., on his lawful occasions or in the intervals of
+    swatting flies <i>In Mesopotamia</i> (<span class="sc">Hodder
+    and Stoughton</span>), there came some thoughts pleasant and
+    bitter, and you can see that he has selected the pleasant and
+    cut out the others, partly because of his loyalty and humour,
+    and partly, no doubt, in deference to the prejudices of
+    censorship. And he writes his selection of printable remarks in
+    a very agreeable and not undistinguished idiom, pointing the
+    narrative with reflections sane and sage enough. He has also
+    made some water-colour notes (here reproduced in colour) of
+    things seen; not remarkable, but adequate to convey an
+    impression. We have all lamented the confusions (shall we call
+    them?) of the medical service, and the trials of our troops in
+    that blessed region entered through Kurna, the Gate of the
+    Garden of Eden, in the early days of the Mesopotamian
+    adventure. The author reports a radical improvement, and if
+    Eden isn't exactly the name you'd give to this pest-ridden
+    country at least the fighting men are now backed by the
+    devotion and competence of the healing men, and all goes well
+    for both. To the bulldog might well be added the retriever as
+    our national emblem. We are some retrievers.</p>
+    <hr />
+
+    <div class="figcenter" style="width:50%;">
+        <a href="images/344.png"><img width="100%"
+        src="images/344.png" alt="OUR MIXED ARMY." /></a>
+
+        <h5>OUR MIXED ARMY.</h5>
+
+        <p><i>Refined Ex-Journalist</i>. "<span class="sc">Don't
+        you think that cook has stressed the onions a little in the
+        stew to-day</span>?"</p>
+    </div>
+    <hr />
+
+    <p>From an article headed "Outlook for Oil":&mdash;</p>
+
+    <blockquote class="note">
+        <p>"It is urged in commercial circles that the Government
+        should secure men with laboratory experience, plus a
+        complete absence of practical knowledge, to report on shale
+        deposits."&mdash;<i>Australian Paper</i>.</p>
+    </blockquote>
+
+    <p>We thought it was only in the Old Country that Governments
+    had any use for that sort of man.</p>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<hr class="full" />
+<p>***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI, VOL. 152, MAY 23, 1917***</p>
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+The Project Gutenberg eBook, Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 152, May
+23, 1917, by Various, Edited by Owen Seaman
+
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+
+
+
+Title: Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 152, May 23, 1917
+
+
+Author: Various
+
+Release Date: March 31, 2005  [eBook #15512]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII)
+
+
+***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI,
+VOL. 152, MAY 23, 1917***
+
+
+E-text prepared by Jonathan Ingram, Sandra Brown, and the Project
+Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team
+
+
+
+Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this
+      file which includes the original illustrations.
+      See 15512-h.htm or 15512-h.zip:
+      (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/5/5/1/15512/15512-h/15512-h.htm)
+      or
+      (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/5/5/1/15512/15512-h.zip)
+
+
+
+
+
+PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI
+
+VOL. 152
+
+MAY 23, 1917
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+CHARIVARIA.
+
+MR. WILLIAM WATSON describes his new book of verse, _The Man Who Saw_,
+as "an intermittent commentary on the main developments and some of
+the collateral phenomena of the War." People are already asking, "Why
+was a man like this left out of the Dardanelles Commission?"
+
+       ***
+
+Weeds are a source of great trouble to the amateur gardener, says a
+contemporary, because he is not always able to recognise them. A good
+plan is to pull them out of the ground. If they come up again they are
+weeds.
+
+       ***
+
+We hope that Mr. CHARLES COCHRAN is not indisposed, but we have not
+noticed a new revue by him this week.
+
+       ***
+
+Sulphur from Italy is being distributed by the Explosives Committee.
+This body must not be confused with the Expletives Committee, which
+gets it supply of sulphur straight from the Front.
+
+       ***
+
+The Metropolitan Water Board is appealing against waste of water. It
+is proposed to provide patriotic householders with attractive cards
+stating that the owner of the premises in which the card is displayed
+is bound in honour not to touch the stuff.
+
+       ***
+
+According to a member of the Inventions Board, over two thousand
+solutions of the U-boat problem have already been received.
+Unfortunately this is more than the number of U-boats available for
+experiment, but it is hoped that by strictly limiting the allowance to
+one submarine per invention the question may be determined in a manner
+satisfactory to the greatest possible number.
+
+       ***
+
+Of eight applications received by the Barnes Council for the vacancy
+of Inspector of Nuisances three came from men of military age. It is
+expected that the Council will suggest that these gentlemen should be
+invited to inspect the nuisances in front of the British trenches.
+
+       ***
+
+The proprietor of thirteen steam rollers told the Egham Tribunal that
+in two years he had only been able to take one of them out of the
+yard. We cannot think that he has really tried. Much might have been
+done with kindness and a piece of cheese, while we have often seen
+quite large steam rollers being enticed along the road by a man with a
+red flag.
+
+       ***
+
+A Swiss correspondent is informed that "Hindenburg's legs are no
+longer strong enough to support him." The weakness appears to be
+gradually extending to his arms.
+
+       ***
+
+"The starched collar must go," remarks a contemporary ruefully.
+Not, we hope, before a substitute has been found for some of those
+unwashable necks.
+
+       ***
+
+"Lady conductors," said the Underground Railway official last week,
+"must remember that the seats and straps are put there for the use of
+the passengers." We know all about straps, but we have often wondered
+what it feels like to use one of the seats on the Underground.
+
+       ***
+
+The police have raided a coining plant in Marylebone. It is becoming
+more and more difficult to make money.
+
+       ***
+
+Under a recent Government order the importation of wild animals into
+Great Britain is forbidden. Allotment holders throughout the country
+hope the order will be read out to any wireworm or potato-moth that
+attempts to land at our ports.
+
+       ***
+
+A deputation to the FOOD CONTROLLER has demanded that the allowance of
+bread to farm labourers should be increased to two pounds per head per
+day. The amount is considered excessive in view of the national needs,
+and the alternative course of permitting them to eat all they can grow
+is being favourably considered.
+
+       ***
+
+Mr. MITCHEL, the Mayor of New York, has forbidden musicians to play
+the National Anthems of the Allies in ragtime. Mr. MITCHEL is a great
+humanitarian and simply hates the sound of anything in pain.
+
+       ***
+
+The German Society of Actors and Singers had forbidden its members
+to sing in the United States. Enthusiasts from the latter country
+are planning an early trip to Northern France rather than miss
+entertainment in the Siegfried and Wotan line.
+
+       ***
+
+Following so closely upon the report that a Wallasey woman had
+discovered a German coin in a loaf of bread we were not surprised by a
+contemporary headline, "Seymour Hicks in a new Role."
+
+       ***
+
+Damage to the extent of twenty-five thousand pounds is said to have
+been caused to the crops in Australia by mice, and the Australian
+authorities contemplate the purchase of a mouse trap.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+[Illustration: _Economist_ (_soliloquising_). "WE MUST ALL DENY
+OURSELVES SOMETHING. AND TO THINK, DESPITE THE PAPER SHORTAGE, PEOPLE
+ARE STILL SMOKING CIGARETTES."]
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    AN IRISH SETTLEMENT.
+
+    "Miss----, who elected to serve fourteen days' imprisonment
+    rather than pay a fine for an alleged assault arising out of
+    a little commotion in Cork, was, on her release from prison,
+    presented with a gold mounted umbrella in compensation for
+    the one she broke on a policeman's head."--_Evening Herald_
+    (_Dublin_).
+
+In view of the admission in the last sentence, "alleged" is good.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    "New York, Friday.--An elaborate programme of welcome will
+    be escorted to the City Hall, which has been prepared. The
+    British Mission has been strikingly decorated for the occasion
+    with innumerable British and Allied flags."--_Liverpool Post_.
+
+We are not anxiously awaiting a snapshot of Mr. BALFOUR in his latest
+costume.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    "The vessels are at present under construction by the Kawashi
+    Dockyard Company, Limited, of Kobe, and realised from L42 to
+    L42 per ton deadweight."--_Poverty Bay Herald_.
+
+A careful calculation will show that the average cost was almost
+exactly forty guineas.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    "Several rhubord recipes have come in this week, so that the
+    reader who esquired for recipe for rhubard jelly is supplied
+    with this, and recipes for other rhubarb dainties as
+    well."--_Edmonton Journal_ (_Canada_).
+
+If _John Gilpin_ were to "dine at Edmonton" (Canada) he would come in
+for some nice new vegetables.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+A PLACE OF ARMS.
+
+    [Inscribed by a humble member of the Inner Temple to the
+    Benchers of his Inn.]
+
+  I knew a garden green and fair,
+    Flanking our London river's tide,
+  And you would think, to breathe its air
+    And roam its virgin lawns beside,
+  All shimmering in their velvet fleece,
+  "Nothing can hurt this haunt of Peace."
+
+  No trespass marred that close retreat;
+    Privileged were the few that went
+  Pacing its walks with measured beat
+    On legal contemplation bent;
+  And Inner Templars used to say:
+  "How well our garden looks today!"
+
+  But That which changes all has changed
+    This guarded pleasaunce, green and fair,
+  And soldier-ranks therein have ranged
+    And trod its beauty hard and bare,
+  Have tramped and tramped its fretted floor
+  Learning the discipline of War.
+
+  And many a moon of Peace shall climb
+     Above that mimic Field of Mars
+  Before the healing touch of Time
+     With springing green shall hide its scars;
+  But Inner Templars smile and say:
+  "Our barrack-square looks well today."
+
+  Good was that garden in their eyes,
+     Lovely its spell of long-ago;
+  Now waste and mired its glory lies,
+     And yet they hold it dearer so,
+  Who see beneath the wounds it bears
+  A grace no other garden wears.
+
+  For still the memory, never sere,
+     But fresh as after fallen rain,
+  Of those who learned their lesson here
+     And may not ever come again,
+  Gives to this garden, bruised and browned,
+  A greenness as of hallowed ground.
+
+O.S.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+RANDOM FLIGHTS.
+
+BY MARCUS MACLEOD.
+
+(_With renewed acknowledgments to "The Skittish Weekly."_)
+
+It was with inexpressible relief that I heard of the narrow escape
+of the Rev. Urijah Basham. Presiding at a jumble sale at Sidcup he
+described how he had been within an ace of partaking of rhubarb leaves
+at luncheon on the previous day, but, having read in the morning's
+paper of their fatal results, wisely decided to abstain. I need hardly
+remind my readers that Mr. Basham is, after the Rev. JOSEPH HOCKING,
+perhaps our greatest preacher-novelist. The jumble sale was held in
+the beautiful concert hall of the Sidcup Temperance Congregational
+Reed Band. The Dowager-Lady Bowler, Sir Moses Pimblett, and the Rev.
+Chadley Bandman were amongst those who graced the function with their
+presence.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+A correspondent has kindly sent me a copy of _The Little Diddlington
+Parish Magazine_ for April. In it there is an interesting letter
+claiming that the original of _Mr. Pickwick_ was a benevolent
+gentleman named Swizzle, who was temporarily employed as perpetual
+curate of Little Diddlington in the sixties. The evidence on which
+this identification is founded seems to me somewhat unconvincing, as
+_Pickwick_ was published in the year 1836. But Nature, as it has
+been finely said, often borrows from Art, and Fact may similarly be
+inspired to emulate Fiction.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+I promised not to trouble my readers again with the Mystery of the Man
+in the Iron Mask. But I may be allowed merely to mention that there
+is an excellent study of the subject in _The Methodist Monthly_, by
+my old friend, Professor Corker. The article, which runs to nearly
+seventy pages, does the utmost credit to this brilliant writer, who
+comes to the conclusion that no satisfactory solution of the mystery
+has ever been propounded or ever can be. But while his examination of
+the different theories is singularly free from bias he is evidently
+impressed by the ingenious view of Dr. Amos Stoot, the eminent Chicago
+alienist, that the masked inmate of the Bastille immured himself
+voluntarily in order to investigate the conditions of French prison
+life at the time, but, owing to the homicidal development of
+his subliminal consciousness, was detained indefinitely by the
+authorities, and during his imprisonment wrote the _Letters of
+Junius_.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+I have been reading with much enjoyment, and I hope profit, a
+book entitled _Behind the Ivory Gate; Being the Reminiscences of a
+Dentist_, by Orlando Pullar, F.R.D.S. Mr. Pullar's opportunities for
+studying the psychology of his clients have been exceptional, and he
+has turned them to rich account in these fascinating pages. He is,
+moreover, as adroit with his pen as with the instruments of his humane
+and benevolent calling, and has a pretty wit. Thus he tells us that
+his villa at Balham is named "Tusculum," and that, in view of the fact
+that three generations of Pullars have been dentists, his family can
+be said to be of "old extraction." This pleasant quip I seem to have
+heard before; but, with all deductions, there are many signs here of
+a strong sagacious mind, that brings to bear on all the jars of daily
+life the priceless emollient of moral uplift.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+[Illustration: THE HYPNOTIST.
+
+BETHMANN-HOLLWEG: "KEEP LOOKING AT ME. YOU'RE WINNING THE WAR! YOU'RE
+WINNING THE WAR! YOU'RE WINNING THE WAR!"]
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+THE MUD LARKS.
+
+Never have I seen a kiltie platoon wading through the cold porridge
+of snow and slush of which our front used to be composed, but I have
+said, with my French friend, "_Mon Dieu, les currents d'air!_" and
+thank Fate that I belong to a race which reserves its national costume
+for fancy-dress balls.
+
+It is very well for MacAlpine of Ben Lomond, who has stalked his
+haggis and devoured it raw, who beds down on thistles for preference
+and grows his own fur; but it is very hard on Smith of Peckham, who
+through no fault of his own finds himself in a Highland regiment,
+trying to make his shirt-tails do where his trousers did before. But
+the real heather-mixture, double-distilled Scot is a hardy bird with
+different ideas from _nous autres_ as to what is cold: also as to what
+is hot. Witness the trying experience of our Albert Edward.
+
+Our Albert Edward and a Hun rifle grenade arrived at the same place at
+the same time, intermingled and went down to the Base to be sifted. In
+the course of time came a wire from our Albert Edward, saying he
+had got the grenade out of his system and was at that moment at the
+railhead; were we going to send him a horse or weren't we?
+
+Emma was detailed for the job, which was a mistake, because Emma was
+not the mount for a man who had been softening for five months in
+hospital. She had only two speeds in her repertoire, a walk which
+slung you up and down her back from her ears to her croup, and a trot
+which jarred your teeth loose and rattled the buttons off your tunic.
+However, she went to the railhead and Albert Edward mounted her, threw
+the clutch into the first speed and hammered out the ten miles to our
+camp, arriving smothered in snow and so stiff we had to lift him down,
+so raw it was a mockery to offer him a chair, and therefore he had to
+take his tea off the mantelpiece.
+
+We advised a visit to Sandy. Sandy was the hot bath merchant. He
+lurked in a dark barn at the end of the village, and could be found
+there at anytime of any day, brooding over the black cauldrons in
+which the baths were brewed, his Tam-o'-shanter drooped over one eye,
+steam condensing on his blue nose. Theoretically the hot baths were
+free, but in practice a franc pressed into Sandy's forepaw was found
+to have a strong calorific effect on the water.
+
+So down the village on all fours, groaning like a Dutch brig in a
+cross-sea, went our Albert Edward. He crawled into the dark barn and,
+having no smaller change, contributed a two-franc bill to the forepaw
+and told Sandy about his awful stiffness. His eloquence and the double
+fee broke Sandy's heart. With great tears in his eyes he assured
+Albert Edward that the utmost resources of his experience and
+establishment should be mobilised on his (Albert Edward's) behalf, and
+ushered him tenderly into that hidden chamber, constructed of sacking
+screens, which was reserved for officers. Albert Edward peeled his
+clothes gingerly from him, and Sandy returned to his cauldrons.
+
+The peeling complete, Albert Edward sat in the draughts of the inner
+chamber and waited for the bath. The outer chamber was filled with
+smoke, and the flames were leaping six feet above the cauldrons; but
+every time Albert Edward holloaed for his bath Sandy implored another
+minute's grace.
+
+Finally Albert Edward could stand the draughts no longer and ordered
+Sandy, on pain of court-martial and death, to bring the water, hot or
+not.
+
+Whereupon Sandy reluctantly brought his buckets along, and, grumbling
+that neither his experience nor establishment had had a fair chance,
+emptied them into the tub. Albert Edward stepped in without further
+remark and sat down.
+
+The rest of the story I had from my groom and countryman, who, along
+with an odd hundred other people, happened to be patronising the outer
+chamber tubs at the time. He told me that suddenly they heard "a yowl
+like a man that's afther bein' bit be a mad dog," and over the screen
+of the inner chamber came our Albert Edward in his birthday dress.
+"Took it in his sthride, Sor, an' coursed three laps round the
+bath-house cursin' the way he'd wither the Divil," said my groom and
+countryman; "then he ran out of the door into the snow an' lay down in
+it." He likewise told me that Albert Edward's performance had caused a
+profound sensation among the other bathers, and they inquired of
+Sandy as to the cause thereof; but Sandy shook his Tam-o'-shanter and
+couldn't tell them; hadn't the vaguest idea. The water he had given
+Albert Edward was hardly scalding, he said; hardly scalding, with
+barely one packet of mustard dissolved in it.
+
+Our Albert Edward is still taking his meals off the mantelpiece.
+
+I met my friend, the French battery commander, yesterday. He was
+cantering a showy chestnut mare over the turf, humming a tune aloud.
+He looked very fit and very much in love with the world. I asked him
+what he meant by it. He replied that he couldn't help it; everybody
+was combining to make him happy; his C.O. had fallen down a gun-pit
+and broken a leg; he had won two hundred francs from his pet enemy; he
+had discovered a jewel of a cook; and then there was always the Boche,
+the perfectly priceless, absolutely ridiculous, screamingly funny
+little Boche. The Boche, properly exploited, was a veritable fount of
+joy. He dreaded the end of the War, he assured me, for a world without
+Boches would be a salad sans the dressing.
+
+I inquired as to how the arch-humourist had been excelling himself
+lately.
+
+The Captain passaged his chestnut alongside my bay, chuckled and told
+me all about it. It appeared that one wet night he was rung up by
+the Infantry to say that the neighbouring Hun was up to some funny
+business, and would he stand by for a barrage, please?
+
+What sort of funny business was the Hun putting up?
+
+Oh, a rocket had gone up over the way and they thought it was a signal
+for some frightfulness or other.
+
+He stood by for half an hour, and then, as nothing happened, turned
+in. Ten minutes later the Infantry rang up again. More funny business;
+three rockets had gone up.
+
+He stood by for an hour with no result, then sought his bunk once
+more, cursing all men. Confound the Infantry getting the jumps over
+a rocket or two! Confound them two times! Then a spark of inspiration
+glowed within him, glowed and flamed brightly. If his exalted _poilus_
+got the wind up over a handful of rockets, how much more also would
+the deteriorating Boche?
+
+Gurgling happily, he brushed the rats off his chest and the beetles
+off his face, turned over and went to sleep. Next morning he wrote
+a letter to his "god-mother" in Paris ("_une petite femme, tres
+intelligente, vous savez_"), and ten days later her parcels came
+tumbling in. The first night (a Monday) he gave a modest display,
+red and white rockets bursting into green stars every five minutes.
+Tuesday night more rockets, with a few Catherine-wheels thrown in.
+Wednesday night, Catherine-wheels and golden rain, and so on until the
+end of the week, when they finished up with a grand special attraction
+and all-star programme, squibs, Catherine-wheels, Roman candles,
+Prince of Wales' feathers, terminating in a blinding, fizzing barrage
+of coloured rockets, and "God bless our Home" in golden stars.
+
+"All very pretty," said I, "but what were the results?"
+
+"Precisely what I anticipated. A deserter came over yesterday who was
+through it all and didn't intend to go through it again. They had got
+the wind up properly, he said, hadn't had a wink of sleep for a week.
+His officers had scratched themselves bald-headed trying to guess what
+it was all about. All ranks stood to continuously, up to their waists
+in mud, frozen stiff and half drowned, while _my_ brave little rogues
+of _poilus_, mark you, slept warm in their dug-outs, and the only man
+on duty was the lad who was touching the fireworks off. O friend of
+mine, there is much innocent fun to be got out of the Boche if you'll
+only give him a chance!"
+
+PATLANDER.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+[Illustration: _Verger_ (_to Mrs. Smith, about to wed for fourth
+time_). "VERY UNUSUAL INDEED, MRS. SMITH. I CAN'T REMEMBER ANY OF THE
+OTHER THREE BEING QUITE SO LATE AS THIS."]
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    "The position of men who were not 41 before June 24, 1917,
+    and who have since attained 41 is again the subject of much
+    confusion."--_Daily Dispatch_.
+
+We can well believe this.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+[Illustration: _Mollie_ (_who has been naughty and condemned to
+"no toast"_). "OH, MUMMY! ANYTHING BUT THAT! I'D RATHER HAVE A HARD
+SMACK--_ANYWHERE YOU LIKE_."]
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+A CURE FOR CURIOSITY.
+
+(_An Idealistic Fable_.)
+
+  Alfonso Ebenezer Scutt
+  Could never keep his mouth close shut;
+  And when I mention that his tongue
+  Was flexible and loosely hung,
+  You will begin to understand
+  Why he was honoured in our land.
+
+  A lucky _coup_ in mining shares
+  Released him from financial cares,
+  And though his wife was strangely plain--
+  A lady of Peruvian strain--
+  She had a handsome revenue
+  Derived from manganese and glue.
+  Thus fortified, in Nineteen-Six
+  Alfonso entered politics,
+  Ousting from Sludgeport-on-the-Ouse
+  A Tory of old-fashioned views.
+  Alfonso Scutt, though wont to preach
+  In chapels, rarely made a speech,
+  But managed very soon to climb
+  To eminence at Question Time.
+  Fired by insatiable thirst
+  For knowledge, from the very first
+  He launched upon an endless series
+  Of quite unnecessary queries,
+  Till overworked officials came
+  To loathe the mention of his name.
+  At last their anguish grew so keen
+  The Premier had to intervene,
+  And by a tactful master-stroke
+  Relieved them from Alfonso's yoke.
+  By way of liberal reward
+  He made the childless Scutt a lord,
+  And then despatched him on a Mission
+  In honorific recognition
+  Of presents sent for our relief
+  By a renowned New Guinea Chief.
+  The natives of those distant parts
+  Are noted for their generous hearts,
+  But, spite of protests raised by us,
+  Continue anthropophagous.
+  And this, I have no doubt, was why,
+  When Members wished Lord Scutt good-bye,
+  You could not see one humid eye.
+       *       *       *       *       *
+  The moral of this simple strain
+  I trust is adequately plain.
+  When people crave for information
+  Unfit, in war, for publication,
+  They take a line, from vice or levity,
+  That's not conducive to longevity.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+AN AFRICAN APPEAL.
+
+The Baboo must look to his laurels, for other dusky aspirants to
+fluent articulate culture are on the warpath, and they are by no means
+to be underrated. I have seen lately quite a number of letters from
+young studious gentlemen of Ashantee, who, having acquired a little
+English, desire more, and develop a passion for correspondence with
+English strangers, whose names they pick up. The following typical
+example, dated March 9th, 1917, will serve to illustrate the new
+habit:--
+
+    "DEAR SIR,--I am with much pleasure to indite you about your
+    name that has come to my hand with great, joy. On the receipt
+    of this letter, know that I want to be one of your fellow
+    friends. You have been reported to me by a friend of mine of
+    your good attention and benevolences. My openion of writing
+    you is to say, I want to take you as my favourite friend.
+    Everything or news that may be happened there at your side, I
+    wish you to report same to me. And I also shall report same
+    to you satisfaction. Will you be good enough to agree with
+    me? Then I hope to get few lines of news from you being as
+    you consented or disconsented. To have a friend at abroad is
+    something that delights the life. I am earnestly requested to
+    hear from you soon. I beg to detain, dear Sir,
+
+                       "Yrs truly,
+                            ----."
+
+To whom do you think that letter is addressed? You would suppose to
+some public personage with a reputation for cordial sympathy with the
+young and earnest, such as the CHIEF SCOUT, for instance. But no, the
+"Dear Sir" is in reality a limited liability company, one of whose
+circulars, I suppose, wandered to the Gold Coast.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+THE LAW COURTS THEATRE.
+
+"ROMNEY'S RUM 'UN."
+
+London was probably never richer in comic actors than at the present
+moment, for not only is W.H. BERRY at the Adelphi, LESLIE HENSON at
+the Gaiety, ARTHUR ROBERTS at the Oxford singing his old songs, and
+ROBERT HALE and GEORGE ROBEY twice daily elsewhere, but in the Law
+Courts Playhouse CHARLES DARLING has been lately at his very best.
+Dropping in there last week, during the performance of a new
+farce, entitled _Romney's Rum 'Un_, I was again fascinated by the
+inexhaustible wit and allusive badinage of this great little comedian,
+beside whose ready gagging GEORGE GRAVES himself is inarticulate. Had
+not GEORGE ROBEY invented for application to himself the descriptive
+phrase, "The Prime Minister of Mirth," it should be at once affixed to
+the Law Courts' fun-maker; but, since it is too late to use that, let
+us think of him as "The Chancellor of the Exchequer of Mirth."
+
+CHARLES DARLING'S success is the more remarkable because he keeps so
+still. He sits in his chair as steadily as another of his outdistanced
+rivals, SAM MAYO ("The Immobile Comedian," as he is called), remains
+standing. He has few gestures; he rarely, if ever, sings, and I have
+never seen him dance; and yet the way in which he "gets over" is
+astonishing. "Laughter holding both his sides" is the most constant
+attendant of this theatre.
+
+What is the secret? Well, first and foremost it is of course to be
+sought in the genius of the actor himself; but contributory causes are
+the acceptivity of the audience, which is more noticeable in the Law
+Courts than in any other London theatre, and the willingness of his
+fellow-performers to "feed" him, as stage-folk have it; that is to
+say, provide him with materials upon which (again resorting to stage
+language) he may "crack his wheezes." The other day, for example, that
+excellent comedian, JOHN SIMON, was his principal ally in this way,
+and nothing could have been better than the sympathy between the two
+funny men. To CHARLES DARLING naturally fell the fat of the dialogue,
+but no one enjoyed the treat more than JOHN SIMON, in whose dictionary
+the word jealousy does not exist. LESLIE SCOTT also did his best to
+"feed" his principal, and the results were a scream.
+
+If the jokes were now and then a little legal, what did it matter?
+Many of the audience were legal too, and that there is no better
+audience the reports of the farces played here day after day
+abundantly prove. They are out for fun, and therefore in an
+appreciative and complaisant mood.
+
+To prove a comedian's genius to the mere reader is a difficult
+matter, and one can never hope to re-embody him in all his humorous
+idiosyncracies; but quotation comes to one's aid, and in the case
+of such a wit as CHARLES DARLING it is invaluable. Thus JOHN SIMON,
+referring to Mrs. SIDDONS' unwieldiness in her old age, said that in
+a certain part she had to be helped from her knees by two attendants.
+Quick as lightning came the comment, "When she was younger she was
+able to rise on her own merits." Was ever so exquisitely funny and
+unexpected a turn given to the dull word "merits"? Another
+perfect thing from this diverting piece, followed also by Homeric
+cachinnations, was the mock-serious apophthegm: "If a cloud is going
+to support a lady of substantial proportions, you must make it fairly
+solid."
+
+I came away with reluctance, filled with wonder at the want of
+enterprise shown by our revue-managers in not having, long ere now,
+secured CHARLES DARLING'S services. If only he continues to take
+his art seriously he has a great future. Meanwhile I am applying
+embrocation to my sore sides.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+NATURE NOTES.
+
+    _"The Gloaming,"_
+
+    _North Kensington_.
+
+
+    DEAR MR. PUNCH,--I wonder if any of your intelligent readers
+    have noticed the wonderful adaptability of Nature, of which I
+    send you the following remarkable instance:--The yellowhammer,
+    which we are always told sings, "A little bit of bread and no
+    che-e-ese," has (unless my ears grossly deceive me) changed
+    its words this year to "A little bit of cheese and no
+    bre-e-ead!" Need I say more?
+
+    Your obedient servant, OBSERVATOR.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    "Mr. Isaac L.---- is in Cape Town. We hope the change will do
+    Mrs. L.---- good."--_Weekly Paper_.
+
+We trust that no domestic differences are indicated.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    "The bread ...had been collected from local hostels and
+    barracks for pigs."--_Daily Mail_.
+
+Does the writer delicately hesitate to call a sty a sty, or has the
+internment of the food-hog really begun?
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    "Lord Robert Cecil concluded: 'There is a well-known French
+    proverb, Que; messieurs, les assassins commencement--let the
+    murderers begin.'"--_Daily News_.
+
+Our contemporary has begun.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+REVENTLOW RUMINATES.
+
+  I have no wounds to show; the cannon's thunder
+    Does not impair my rest. It's just as well,
+  For, though I dote on blood, and thoughts of plunder
+    Act on my jaded spirit like a spell,
+  I could not but regard it as a blunder
+    If Prussia's foremost scribe should stop a shell.
+
+  So, while I sport the usual iron crosses,
+    No feats of valour pinned them on my breast,
+  But writing up the sanguinary losses
+    Inflicted by our genius in the West.
+  The punctual theme of my Imperial boss is
+    "Turn on a victory!" and I do the rest.
+
+  To praise each spasm of ruthlessness that passes
+    Down cringing HOLLWEG'S compromising spine,
+  Boost the pretensions of the ruling classes
+    And hail the Hohenzollerns as divine,
+  And never hesitate to tell the masses
+    They are and will continue to be swine:--
+
+  These are my task. And there are compensations
+    About the job that field-grey heroes lack.
+  Although, e.g., there is a dearth of rations,
+    I'm not the one that goes without his whack;
+  Nor do the bayonets of inferior nations
+    Send nervous chills down my retreating back.
+
+  Yet sometimes in the small and early watches
+    I think, "Good Lord! suppose the U-boats fail!
+  Or our Colossus of the purple blotches
+    Should let the Allies get him by the tail!
+  Suppose this war is one of Deutschland's botches,
+    And Right, not Might, should happen to prevail!"
+
+  There'd be a revolution; nought could stop it.
+    Not that I'd weep if WILHELM had to go;
+  But what if Holy Junkerdom should cop it?
+    That would be most unfortunate--and, oh!
+  Supposing Count REVENTLOW had to hop it,
+    Kultur would never rally from the blow.
+
+ALGOL.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+ROYAL ACADEMY DEPRESSIONS.--II.
+
+[Illustration: "COME ALONG, YOU LITTLE IMP! I'LL LEARN YOU TO MAKE FUN
+OF MY TROUSERS."]
+
+[Illustration: THE ETERNAL FEMININE.
+
+"THAT'LL DO; DON'T TROUBLE ABOUT YOUR HAIR--WE'RE NOT LIKELY TO MEET
+ANYONE."
+
+"OH, I CAN'T GO LIKE THIS; ONE NEVER KNOWS WHEN A SUBMARINE MAY BOB
+UP."]
+
+[Illustration: THE FOOD SHORTAGE. ARRIVAL OF THE MINT-SAUCE BOAT.]
+
+[Illustration: _Figure on the Seat._ "HE CALLS THIS 'THE GARDEN OF
+MEMORIES,' BUT HE NEARLY FORGOT _ME_."]
+
+[Illustration: UNHAPPY RESULT OF A TOO GENEROUS FRUIT DIET.]
+
+[Illustration: NATIONAL ECONOMY.
+
+"NOW THEN, MY LADS, KEEP YOUR HEADS DOWN OR WE'LL HAVE THE FRAME
+CONTROLLER AFTER US."]
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+[Illustration: _Second-Lieutenant Spooner_ (_unnerved by presence of
+a General inspecting_). "THE COMPANY WILL MOVE TO THE FIGHT IN ROARS.
+FORM--ROARS! FIGHT!"]
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+ZERO.
+
+("_Zero-hour_"--_commonly known as "Zero"_--_is the hour fixed for the
+opening of an Infantry attack._)
+
+  I woke at dawn and flung the window wide.
+    Behind the hedge the lazy river ran;
+  The dusky barges idled down the tide;
+    In the laburnum-tree the birds began;
+  And it was May and half the world in flower;
+    I saw the sun creep over an Eastward brow,
+  And thought, "It may be, this is Zero-hour;
+    Somewhere the lads are 'going over' now."
+
+  Somewhere the guns speak sudden on the height
+    And build for miles their battlement of fire;
+  Somewhere the men that shivered all the night
+    Peer anxious forth and scramble through the wire,
+  Swarm slowly out to where the Maxims bark,
+    And green and red the panic rockets rise;
+  And Hell is loosed, and shyly sings a lark,
+    And the red sun climbs sadly up the skies.
+
+  Now they have won some sepulchred Gavrelle,
+    Some shattered homes in their own dust concealed;
+  Now no Bosch troubles them nor any shell,
+    But almost quiet holds the thankful field,
+  While men draw breath, and down the Arras road
+    Come the slow mules with battle's dreary stores,
+  And there is time to see the wounded stowed,
+    And stretcher-squads besiege the doctors' doors.
+
+  Then belches Hell anew. And all day long
+    The afflicted place drifts heavenward in dust;
+  All day the shells shriek out their devils' song;
+   All day men cling close to the earth's charred crust;
+  Till, in the dusk, the Huns come on again,
+    And, like some sluice, the watchers up the hill
+  Let loose the guns and flood the soil with slain,
+    And they go back, but scourge the village still.
+
+  I see it all. I see the same brave souls
+    To-night, to-morrow, though the half be gone,
+  Deafened and dazed, and hunted from their holes,
+    Helpless and hunger-sick, but holding on.
+  I shall be happy all the long day here,
+    But not till night shall they go up the steep,
+  And, nervous now because the end is near,
+    Totter at last to quietness and to sleep.
+
+  And men who find it easier to forget,
+    In England here, among the daffodils,
+  That there in France are fields unflowered yet,
+    And murderous May-days on the unlovely hills--
+  Let them go walking where the land is fair
+    And watch the breaking of a morn in May,
+  And think, "It may be Zero over there,
+    But here is Peace"--and kneel awhile, and pray.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+    "Surely one result of the war will be that civilised races
+    will regard the German as an outcast unfit to associate with
+    or to have dealings with on equal terms. If he is able to
+    say 'tu grogue' we shall put ourselves in a false
+    position."--_Times of India_.
+
+For ourselves, we decline to do this. We shall simply call him
+another.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+[Illustration: FOR SERVICES RENDERED.
+
+A GERMAN DECORATION FOR BRITISH STRIKERS.]
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+ESSENCE OF PARLIAMENT.
+
+[Illustration: Our racing correspondent writes that Mr. LLOYD GEORGE
+is having some difficulty with his string (Sinn Fein's Beauty GINNELL,
+All and More for Ireland REDMOND, and Ulster CARSON) for the Irish
+Grand National.]
+
+
+_Monday, May 14th_.--No longer will the FIRST SEA LORD be distracted
+from his primary duty of strafing the Hun by the necessity of looking
+after supplies. That function will now be discharged by an hon. and
+temp. Vice-Admiral, in the person of Sir ERIC GEDDES, late hon. and
+temp. Major-General and Director of Transportation to the Army in
+France, and now Shipbuilder-in-Chief to the nation. Everyone
+seemed pleased, with the notable exception of Mr. HOGGE, who cannot
+understand why all these appointments should be showered upon Sir ERIC
+GEDDES, when there are other able Scotsmen still unemployed. A late
+hon. Admiral of the Fleet, now residing at Potsdam, is believed to
+share Mr. HOGGE'S objections.
+
+The hardships endured by the criminal classes when they are so
+unfortunate as to get into prison always strikes a sympathetic chord
+in the gentle breast of Mr. EDMUND HARVEY. His latest discovery is
+that they are allowed the use of writing-paper not more than once a
+month; and for the rest of the time have to entrust their literary
+compositions to the unsympathetic surface of a slate, with the aid of
+a probably squeaky slate-pencil. Could JOHN BUNYAN have written _The
+Pilgrim's Progress_ under such conditions? The question opens up
+a vista of speculation as to the influence of environment upon the
+creative faculty; and it is not surprising that Mr. BRACE was unable
+to answer it offhand.
+
+In ordinary times the Financial Secretary of the Treasury is the most
+important Member of the Government outside the Cabinet. Under the
+present _regime_ he is not a member of the House at all. It is true
+that Mr. BALDWIN takes his place as Parliamentary whipping-boy to the
+CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUER with much grace and good humour; but that
+does not satisfy hon. Members, who want a more substantial object for
+their daily castigation. The debate on this subject revealed a sharp
+division of opinion between Mr. EDWIN MONTAGU and Mr. HERBERT SAMUEL.
+COUSIN EDWIN, as an ex-Secretary of the Treasury, did not think
+the House had suffered any serious loss through being unable to
+cross-examine that official direct. COUSIN HERBERT was shocked at this
+revolutionary sentiment coming from his kinsman. If it were accepted
+there was no logical reason why even the Chancellor of the Exchequer
+should have a seat in the House. Why, indeed, have Ministers at all? A
+row of gramophones, ranged along the Treasury Bench and supplied with
+officially prepared records, would satisfy all legitimate curiosity.
+
+_Tuesday, May 15th_.--I forget how many weeks ago it is since Mr.
+BONAR LAW announced that the Government were going to make one more
+effort to settle the Irish Question, and that in due course the
+PRIME MINISTER would announce their proposals. Since then events have
+conspired to produce successive postponements. Mr. LLOYD GEORGE had to
+go to France--for the War refuses to stop even though Irishmen decline
+to encourage it--Mr. REDMOND fell ill, Archbishop WALSH indited a
+postscript, and an election in South Longford suggested doubts as to
+whether Nationalist M.P.'s were really the Irish nation after all.
+Nevertheless there is a plan; and it is to be communicated, but in the
+first instance to the leaders of Irish parties only, and then, if they
+please, to the Press, and finally, perhaps, to the House of Commons.
+
+_Wednesday, May 16th_.--We all want to help the new Russian Government
+in its difficult task, but I doubt if Mr. SNOWDEN and his pacifist
+friends have contributed to that end by inviting the House of Commons
+to endorse forthwith the "no annexation, no indemnities" declaration
+of a section of the Revolutionaries, and by supporting their proposal
+in a series of speeches which might be summed up in the words "Peace
+at any Price." Even the German CHANCELLOR will not be wholly pleased,
+for the debate revealed that, apart from the seven or eight gentlemen
+who follow the white flag of the Member for Blackburn, the House is
+absolutely fixed in its determination to defeat German militarism
+before talking of peace.
+
+After the searching analysis to which the hon. Member's confident
+statements were subjected by Lord ROBERT CECIL and Mr. A.F. WHYTE
+there was nothing left of them but a trace of acid.
+
+So far as I am aware the Member for Blackburn has never endangered the
+integrity of his principles by helping his country in any way to win
+the War. In this respect Mr. LEES SMITH, who seconded the motion, has
+a less consistent record, for he has worn khaki as an orderly of the
+R.A.M.C. But in his case service abroad seems only to have confirmed
+his peculiar principles, for he thinks that we ought to return the
+German colonies, and enable the natives to enjoy once again the
+blessings of _Kultur_. If he ever saw the Hun while he was in France
+it must have been through a pair of rose-tinted binoculars.
+
+_Thursday, May 17th_.--We are all agog to know whether the PRIME
+MINISTER'S offer of immediate Home Rule to twenty-six Counties of
+Ireland is to be blessed or banned by the Nationalists. This is the
+day when Irish Questions have priority, and the House hears such
+important inquiries as whether Hibernian holiday-makers will have
+their excursion-trains restored to them; what became of a side of
+bacon captured by the police during the Easter Monday rebellion, and
+why a certain magistrate should have been struck off the Commission of
+the Peace for a trifling refusal to take the oath of allegiance. Are
+we to go without this entertainment in the future, or will Mr. REDMOND
+refuse to rob Westminster of its gaiety even for the sake of College
+Green?
+
+If, as I ventured to suggest last week, the CHANCELLOR OF THE
+EXCHEQUER had laid in a stock of tobacco before the Budget he has
+evidently exhausted it by now, for, on his attention again being
+called to the exorbitant charge of the tobacconists, he no longer
+pooh-poohed the matter, but sternly declared that the situation was
+being closely watched.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    COMMERCIAL CANDOUR.
+
+    "The Car that never fails to give anything but satisfaction to
+    its owners."--_Advertisement in "Indian Motor News."_
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+[Illustration: _Amateur_ (_awaiting his turn to perform_). "A-ARE YOU
+NERVOUS, OLD CHAP?"
+
+_Infant Prodigy_ (_ditto_). "WHAT IS 'NERVOUS'?"]
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+MY AMERICAN COUSINS.
+
+  Because they speak the tongue that's mine,
+    Rich in the treasure that belongs
+  To them as well as me, and twine
+    Their heart-strings in our English songs,
+  I knew they'd scorn those German threats
+          And sham regrets.
+
+  Because their country's name is scrolled
+    With Liberty's; because her fate,
+  Like England's own, must be unrolled
+    In Freedom still, they had to hate
+  The thought of bowing down before
+          A Lord of War.
+
+  And now they'll lavish in the strife
+    The gold they've scorned to love too well,
+  And fleets to bring the food that's life,
+    And guns of death, and steel and shell;
+  Defeat or triumph, stand or fall,
+          They'll share their all.
+
+  They're out for business; now's their Day;
+    They took their time, but finished right;
+  The heat got slowly comes to stay;
+    Patient for peace means firm in fight;
+  And so their country still shall be
+          Land of the Free.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    "Remarkable scenes were witnessed at Exeter yesterday at the
+    free distribution of 10,000 lbs. of potatoes in 5 lb. lots.
+    Five thousand people obtained 5 lbs. each."--_Sunday Paper_.
+
+This result was obtained by the forethought of the distributors, who
+had the potatoes laid out on multiplication tables.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+[Illustration: _Farmer_. "WHAT THE BLAZES ARE YOU DOING? AND WITH THEM
+'ORSES STANDIN' HIDLE?"
+
+_Tommy_. "CLEANIN' ME BUTTONS. 'AVEN'T YOU NEVER BEEN A SOLDIER?"]
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+THE DOLLS THAT DID THEIR BIT.
+
+_"Je vous tends mon corbillon: qu'y met-on?"_ asked Jeanne, holding
+out her basket towards the first of her dolls seated in a semi-circle
+before her. Most of them were quite familiar with the game, but for
+the sake of a new-comer Jeanne had explained that each player must
+place in the basket some object the name of which ended with _on_, to
+rhyme with _corbillon_. She had announced that this time the game was
+in aid of a cause, and that therefore it must be played with _things_
+and not with words only.
+
+"Qu'y met-on, Marie?" repeated Jeanne. "Rappelez-vous bien que c'est
+une quete a l'intention des petites filles polonaises internees au
+camp de Havelberg!" What, Marie had nothing but her chain necklace,
+and that did not end in _on?_ No, but the links of the chain did,
+argued Jeanne. "Donne _des chainons!_" she prompted in a whisper. "J'y
+mets des chainons," said Marie in Jeanne's thinnest voice, and the
+necklace found its way into the basket.
+
+"_Je vous tends mon corbillon: qu'y met-on?_ A vous, Marthe. O,"
+exclaimed Jeanne, "tu y mets ton _chignon?_ Eh bien, tu sais, n'est-ce
+pas, beta, qu'il faut que tu t'y mettes avec!" and into the basket she
+went after a lingering caress from Jeanne.
+
+_"Je vous tends mon corbillon: qu'y met-on?"_ It was the turn now of
+Yvonne in her bed. "Comment," said Jeanne, affecting indignation, "si
+tu n'etais pas si frileuse tu donnerais ton edredon?" And what about
+the little _poupees polonaises internees_, snatched from their beds
+and carried off without any bedclothes at all, let alone an eiderdown!
+Presently, "J'y mets mon edredon," Yvonne was understood to say, and
+"Sage!" approved Jeanne.
+
+_"Je vous tends mon corbillon: qu'y met-on?_ Jacques, mon pauvre ami,
+tu n'as pas de chance, hein?" There was no help for it; it was the
+only thing he had that rhymed. "Imagine la joie des petites polonaises
+internees!" she urged, taking the necessary action. "J'y mets mon
+pantalon," piped a disconsolate little thread of voice.
+
+_"Je vous tends mon corbillon: qu'y met-on?_ A vous, Mikadesse!" A
+beam of pleasure, succeeded by a falling of the countenance, then a
+look of decision, ended in a "Houp-la!" as the Japanese doll descended
+into the basket, and was made to say, "J'y mets une poupee du Japon!"
+After all she was an ally of the little polonaises.
+
+_"Je vous tends mon corbillon: qu'y met-on?_ Allons, les jumeaux! a
+vous!" Jeanne thought the twins were really in a plight and that she
+would have to help them out with a gift, but, quick as thought, Castor
+seized Pollux, saying, "J'y mets mon compagnon!" and Pollux, divining
+his intention, grasped Castor, declaring excitedly, "Et moi aussi,
+j'y mets mon compagnon" And into the basket they leapt together. "Ils
+s'entetent a rester inseparables," sighed Jeanne; "c'est bien."
+
+_"Je vous tends mon corbillon: qu'y met-on?"_ Adelaide never had
+possessed anything worth giving away, and yet she seemed to be
+suggesting that the contents of the basket did not look very imposing
+so far, and would hardly be enough to go round among so many little
+Poles, so Jeanne came to the rescue with gifts of toys until "J'y mets
+ma contribution!" came jubilantly forth in a voice that forgot to be
+Adelaide's.
+
+All had now contributed. Yet Jeanne had a feeling that somehow it was
+not the end of the game. She pondered gravely for a few moments, then,
+placing herself solemnly before the mirror, she addressed herself:--
+
+_"Jeanne, je vous tends mon corbillon: qu'y met-on?"_ After a few
+seconds she began to see what she ought to do.
+
+"Qu'y mets-tu, Jeanne?" It would be rather hard, but she must do it.
+
+Sitting down and turning up the skirt of her frock, she took each of
+the contributors, kissed and caressed them, and placed them in her
+lap. Adelaide only did she except, explaining to the others, "Oui,
+mes cheris, je garde Adelaide, car savez-vous bien, c'est elle qui me
+donne des idees; je prends toujours conseil avec elle. Alors, n'est
+ce pas?" Then, carrying the dolls in her petticoat, she solemnly undid
+the button, let it slip down with the dolls inside, and placed it
+resolutely in the basket, saying: "J'y mets mon jupon!"
+
+What was Adelaide saying? One must give cheerfully and not regret the
+gift? _Surtout il ne faut pas verser une larme!_
+
+So, hugging her doll, Jeanne returned to the mirror and added,
+smiling, "Avec sa-tis-fac-ti-on!"
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+[Illustration: _Officer's Servant_ (_replying to adverse criticism of
+war-worn charger_). "I 'EARD THE GUVNOR SAY THERE WAS THREE 'UNDRED
+QUID REFUSED FOR 'IM BEFORE THE WAR. WHAT DO YOU THINK OF THAT?"
+
+_Jock_. "WEEL, I'M THENKIN' THERE WAS TWA FOOLS MET THAT DAY, AND I
+DINNA KEN WHICH O' THEM WAS THE BIGGER."]
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    "Prospects in English Literature.
+         III.--Looking Backward."--_The Athenaeum_.
+
+We trust this is only preliminary to a further advance.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    "Shepherds in Scotland are feeding lambs with whisky and
+    hot milk. Many titled landed proprietors are acting as
+    shepherds."--_Daily News_.
+
+Surely our Radical contemporary does not mean to suggest--
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+FAIRIES.
+
+  There are fairies at the bottom of our garden!
+    It's not so very, very far away;
+  You pass the gardener's shed and you just keep straight ahead;
+    I do so hope they've really come to stay.
+  There's a little wood, with moss in it and beetles,
+    And a little stream that quietly runs through;
+  You wouldn't think they'd dare to come merrymaking there--
+            Well, they do.
+
+  There are fairies at the bottom of our garden!
+    They often have a dance on summer nights;
+  The butterflies and bees make a lovely little breeze,
+    And the rabbits stand about and hold the lights.
+  Did you know that they could sit upon the moonbeams
+    And pick a little star to make a fan,
+  And dance away up there in the middle of the air?
+            Well, they can.
+
+  There are fairies at the bottom of our garden!
+    You cannot think how beautiful they are;
+  They all stand up and sing when the Fairy Queen and King
+    Come gently floating down upon their car.
+  The King is very proud and _very_ handsome;
+    The Queen--now can you guess who that could be
+  (She's a little girl all day, but at night she steals away)?--
+            Well--it's ME!
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+    "Young Lady Wanted, for few months, as Companion-Help
+    (seaside); fare paid and 6d. week pocket-money; or would
+    train Girl as Housemaid, same terms."--_Provincial Paper_.
+
+Such extravagance in war-time ought to be checked.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    "SHADY GERMAN TRICK.
+
+    "In the village of Boisleux-au-Mout the Germans utilised part
+    of the cemetery to bury their own dead, but before doing so
+    deliberately hewed down every tree growing on the side of the
+    ground where the French graves lie."--_Daily Paper_.
+
+Is "shady" quite the right word for this outrage?
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+PEAS AND PLEDGES.
+
+"Has anything special," I said, "been happening during my absence?"
+
+"We are up to our chins in work," said Francesca.
+
+"But is it real work?"
+
+"Of course it is. We've formed a General Committee, of which
+everybody's a member, including you, and we've formed an Executive
+Committee, of which there are about a dozen members. And then there
+are some Sub-Committees."
+
+"Yes, I know. The Executive Committee thinks it's going to do all the
+work, but it's got to report to the General Committee, and it it'll
+be a great piece of luck if the General Committee doesn't insist
+on asserting itself by upsetting all the decisions of the Executive
+Committee."
+
+"Oh, but our General Committee isn't going to be like that at all.
+There won't be any petty jealousy about our General Committee.
+Besides, the Executive Committee has power to act, and it doesn't need
+to report till the Annual Meeting of the General Committee, which is
+to be held a year from now. When that time comes lots of things will
+have happened."
+
+"That," I said, "is one of the truest things you've ever said. Even
+the War may be over by that time."
+
+"But if it isn't we shall all be living on swedes or pea-soup, or
+rice-bread or all three together; and we shall have a food controller
+in every village, and our Committees won't be wanted."
+
+"I beg your pardon; they'll be more wanted than ever to keep
+the controller straight and act as a buffer between him and the
+population."
+
+"But they won't know they're a buffer, and they won't like it when
+some tactless person tells them. Anyhow, that's a long way off, and in
+the meantime we've got the land."
+
+"Who've got what land?"
+
+"Our Committee," said Francesca, "have got two acres of land from
+Mr. Carberry, and we're going to grow a crop of peas on it so that
+everybody may have pea-soup in case of a pinch."
+
+"But what about the peas?" I said, "Have you made sure of those?"
+
+"We had a good deal of trouble about them, but we've got a firm
+promise of six bushels."
+
+"Capital! But are you quite sure you know how to bring the land and
+the peas together?"
+
+"Well, I'm not so much of an expert as I should like to be, but Mr.
+Bolton 's a practical farmer, and he's going to do all he can for us."
+
+"Will he plough it?"
+
+"It's been ploughed twice, so he's undertaken to harrow it and scarify
+it--doesn't it sound awful?--and then something else is going to
+happen to it, but I forget what it's called."
+
+"Wouldn't it be a good thing, at some stage or other, to plant the
+peas?"
+
+"Yes, it would; but you can't do it as simply as all that, can you?
+Isn't there something highly agricultural that you must do first?"
+
+"I should chuck 'em in and chance it."
+
+"A nice farmer you'd make," she said scornfully. "I'm remembering it
+now. It's got something to do with drills."
+
+"Like the Volunteers?"
+
+"No, not a bit like the Volunteers."
+
+"Well, then, like potatoes."
+
+"Yes, more like potatoes, except that they're peas in this case."
+
+"How true," I said.
+
+"Yes. And don't forget that while you were away we formed a League
+of Honour in the village and bound ourselves to observe the FOOD
+CONTROLLER'S rations."
+
+"Am I a member?"
+
+"Yes, we thought you'd like to be one, so I gave your name in."
+
+"I think a man must pledge his own honour. He can't have it done for
+him."
+
+"There's no public ceremony. You can just pledge yourself in your
+mind, and then put a pledge card in one of the windows."
+
+"I'll have tea first," I said, "and then I'll choose the window, and
+then I'll pledge myself in my mind."
+
+"No, you can do the pledging now."
+
+"I've done it, while you were talking."
+
+"And after all it's only the old rations according to Lord DEVONPORT,
+and we've been working under them for some time now."
+
+"So we have," I said; "but of course the card in the window makes all
+the difference."
+
+R.C.L.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+[Illustration: THE SERVANT PROBLEM.
+
+_Lady_. "AND WHY DID YOUR LAST MISTRESS----"
+
+_Applicant_ (_loftily_). "EXCUSE ME, MADAM!"
+
+_Lady_. "WELL--ER--YOUR LAST EMPLOYER----"
+
+_Applicant_. "I BEG YOUR PARDON, MADAM!"
+
+_Lady_. "WELL, THEN, YOUR LAST--ER--PRAY WHAT DO YOU CALL THOSE IN
+WHOSE SERVICE YOU ARE ENGAGED?"
+
+_Applicant_. "CLIENTS, MADAM." [_Collapse of interrogator_.]]
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    OUR MODEST CONTEMPORARIES.
+
+    "Had it been intended to make any new pronouncement of
+    importance the Berlin Government would have taken steps to
+    circulate the speech by wireless in time for publication in
+    'The Star' yesterday evening."--_The Star_.
+
+It is possible that Dr. BETHMANN-HOLLWEG was misled by our
+contemporary's habit of publishing its "7.0 Edition" at 4.30.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+From an obituary notice:--
+
+    "He had studied Eastern religions, and claimed to have been
+    initiated as a llama of Tibet."--_Daily Mail_.
+
+Or should it be the Grand Lama of Peru?
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    "The----Food Economy Committee were astounded yesterday at
+    the secretary's report of a collier's family of six persons
+    who consumed twenty half-quartern loaves in one week,
+    averaging twenty pounds of bread per person."--_Sunday
+    Chronicle_.
+
+It is not stated whether the astonishment was caused by the family's
+appetite or the secretary's arithmetic.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+[Illustration: _Fond Mother_ (_reading_). "'OUR CAPTAIN IS ONE OF THE
+BEST, AND WE'RE READY TO FOLLOW HIM TO H--L.' I SUPPOSE HE MEANS THE
+HINDENBURG LINE."]
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+OUR BOOKING-OFFICE.
+
+(_By Mr. Punch's Staff of Learned Clerks_.)
+
+In the list of heroic young soldier-authors whose gifts the War has
+revealed to us only to snatch them away, the name of DONALD HANKEY
+already holds an honoured place. It will, therefore, be good news to
+the many admirers of _A Student in Arms_ that a further selection of
+these heartening and fine-spirited papers has been prepared under the
+title of _A Student in Arms--Second Series_ (MELROSE). The thousands
+who already know and admire Lieut. HANKEY'S work will need no
+introduction to this, which exhibits all the qualities of courage
+and sympathy that have given the former book a world-wide popularity.
+They, and others, will however welcome the occasion afforded here of
+learning something about the life and personality of the writer, which
+they will do both from the short preface contributed by one whose
+identity is hardly disguised under the initials "H.M.A.H.," and from
+a couple of papers, autobiographical, that end the volume. Rugbieans
+especially will be interested to read DONALD HANKEY'S recollections of
+his school-days, with their tribute to the house-master affectionately
+known to so many generations as "Jackey." A book, in short, that will
+add to the admiration and regret with which its author is spoken of in
+three continents.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+_He Looked in My Window_ (CHATTO AND WINDUS), by ROBERT HALIFAX, gives
+the adventures of _Ruth Shadd_, decentest of dwellers in a meanish
+street, during her determined hunt for a husband. It would have been
+easy to make all this unlovely in its frankness, but the author very
+skilfully (and, I think, very sincerely) avoids this. _Ruth_ is a fine
+girl, with character and candour, those too rare assets, and having
+pursued, and found wanting, _Bert_, the swanker, who hasn't the
+courage for matrimony; the polite and fatuously prudent _Archie_, and
+_Joe_, the vegetarian, who had such exalted faith in malt, she wins
+a deserved happiness with someone that she had never even thought of
+pursuing. Mr. HALIFAX gives me an impression of almost cinematographic
+and gramophonic exactness in his portraiture. _George Shadd_, _Ruth's_
+father, who worked in the gasworks and was one of the very best,
+delighted me particularly, with his pathetic little garden, his battle
+with the slugs and black-fly, and his fine patience with _Mrs. Shadd_,
+who put her washing before his fire and her props among his choicest
+seedlings--a difficult woman indeed. The author writes with humour and
+sympathy; and that is the way to write of this brave if narrow life.
+It is the first time I have looked in Mr. HALIFAX'S window. I shall
+take steps to do so again. 'Tis a nice clean window.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Not even the most confirmed Gallio can avoid caring for _Arthur
+Stanton--A Memoir_, by the Rt. Hon. G.W.E. RUSSELL (LONGMANS), when
+he has once dipped his mind into the book. It is the record of a
+singularly beautiful and beneficent life, lived to the very utmost in
+the service of God and man, and ruled by a simple and direct religion
+which constantly forced practice up to the exalted level of precept.
+Judged by merely worldly standards of achievement, ARTHUR STANTON'S
+life could not be considered a success. He began as curate of St.
+Alban's, Holborn, and as curate of St. Alban's he ended after many
+years of enthusiastic devotion to humanity. He was foiled and thwarted
+by the great ones of the Church, inhibited in one place, suspended in
+another, and frequently doomed to find a Bishop or a Chaplain-General
+set, like a lion, across his path. But nothing could avail to stop
+him where he found a soul that could be saved or misery that could
+be relieved. His congregation, drawn from the slums of Holborn, would
+have died for him to a man, for they realised with how great an ardour
+his life was spent in order that he might help them. His faith was
+not a mystery kept apart for special occasions, but a daily and hourly
+influence vivifying his words and directing his actions. And no man
+could have enjoyed himself more than this true saint and interpreter
+of God to man. His religion was not one of gloom and foreboding, but a
+cheerful and delightful habit of mind and soul. _Tantum religio potuit
+suadere bonorum._ Mr. RUSSELL has done his work with great skill and
+perfect sympathy, and has produced a book that does honour to himself
+and to the beloved friend whom it is his privilege to commemorate.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The many readers of _Punch_ who took a close interest in ALEC
+JOHNSTON'S letters written "At the Back of the Front" and "At the
+Front" will be glad to have them in collected form. The memory of his
+gallant end--he was killed in action after the brilliant capture of
+a salient near Ypres, at the head of his company of Shropshires--is
+fresh in all our hearts. A preface to _At the Front_ (CONSTABLE)
+contains an appreciation of his high character and soldierly qualities
+by his friend and fellow-officer, Captain INGRAM, R.A.M.C., D.S.O.,
+M.C., who a few weeks later was himself killed. It is a fine tribute
+paid by one true soldier to another. These letters of ALEC JOHNSTON,
+as their editor reminds us, "were composed in the brief interludes
+snatched from hard fighting and hard fatigues. They never pretended
+to be more than the gay and cynical banter of one who brought to the
+perils of life at the Front an incurable habit of humour. They are
+typical of that brave spirit, essentially English, that makes light of
+the worst that fate can send."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+It must, I should think, be exceedingly difficult to find a new title
+in these days for a volume of reminiscences. Mr. RAYMOND BLATHWAYT
+seems to have solved the problem happily enough by calling his
+contribution to the rapidly-increasing library of recollections,
+_Through Life and Round the World_ (ALLEN). One way and another,
+first as a curate (rightly termed by the publishers "rather
+unconventional"), later as journalist, Mr. BLATHWAYT has contrived to
+use a pair of remarkably open eyes with excellent effect. The result
+is this fat volume, whose contents, if honesty constrains me to call
+the most of them gossip, are at least generally entertaining and never
+ill-natured. Needless to say, Mr. BLATHWAYT, like the elder _Capulet_,
+can "tell a tale such as will please." For myself, out of a goodly
+store, I should select for first honours a repartee, new to me, of
+Sir HERBERT TREE (forgive this dropping into rhyme!). It tells of a
+boastful old-time actor, vaunting his triumphs as _Hamlet_, when "the
+audience took fifteen minutes leaving the theatre." "_Was ha lame?_"
+If our only HERBERT did not in fact make this reply, I can only hope
+that he will at once hasten home and do so. But while we are upon Mr.
+BLATHWAYT'S dramatic recollections, I must respectfully traverse his
+dictum that some of the acting at the local pageants of a few years
+back "surpassed the very best I have seen upon the stage." As one who
+took a personal part in many of those well-meant revivals, and dates
+a relaxed throat from the effort of vociferating history, up-wind,
+towards a stand full of ear-straining auditors, I bow but remain
+unconvinced.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Although the literary style of Mr. JULIUS M. PRICE, of _The
+Illustrated London News_, is too breezy for my taste, I am glad to
+have read his _Six Months on the Italian Front_ (CHAPMAN AND HALL).
+Possibly he under-estimates our appreciation of Italy's share in the
+War's burden, but his account of the conditions prevailing upon the
+Italian front, and of the courage and skill with which they have been
+overcome, deserves our undiluted approval. It is difficult to believe
+that anyone who is not at least a member of the Alpine Club can
+dimly realise the engineering feats which the Italian soldiers have
+performed. Mr. PRICE has been given many opportunities of observation,
+and where none was given to him he has contrived to make them for
+himself. And the result is a book full of incident and excitement.
+I hope that he will pardon me when I add that my sense of gratitude
+would have been greater if, in addition to the photograph of
+himself--or even instead of it--he had given us a map. For the rest
+his illustrations are excellent.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+To MARTIN SWAYNE, officer in the R.A.M.C., on his lawful occasions
+or in the intervals of swatting flies _In Mesopotamia_ (HODDER AND
+STOUGHTON), there came some thoughts pleasant and bitter, and you can
+see that he has selected the pleasant and cut out the others, partly
+because of his loyalty and humour, and partly, no doubt, in deference
+to the prejudices of censorship. And he writes his selection of
+printable remarks in a very agreeable and not undistinguished idiom,
+pointing the narrative with reflections sane and sage enough. He
+has also made some water-colour notes (here reproduced in colour) of
+things seen; not remarkable, but adequate to convey an impression. We
+have all lamented the confusions (shall we call them?) of the medical
+service, and the trials of our troops in that blessed region entered
+through Kurna, the Gate of the Garden of Eden, in the early days of
+the Mesopotamian adventure. The author reports a radical improvement,
+and if Eden isn't exactly the name you'd give to this pest-ridden
+country at least the fighting men are now backed by the devotion and
+competence of the healing men, and all goes well for both. To the
+bulldog might well be added the retriever as our national emblem. We
+are some retrievers.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+[Illustration: OUR MIXED ARMY.
+
+_Refined Ex-Journalist_. "DON'T YOU THINK THAT COOK HAS STRESSED THE
+ONIONS A LITTLE IN THE STEW TO-DAY?"]
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+From an article headed "Outlook for Oil":--
+
+    "It is urged in commercial circles that the Government should
+    secure men with laboratory experience, plus a complete
+    absence of practical knowledge, to report on shale
+    deposits."--_Australian Paper_.
+
+We thought it was only in the Old Country that Governments had any use
+for that sort of man.
+
+
+
+***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI, VOL.
+152, MAY 23, 1917***
+
+
+******* This file should be named 15512.txt or 15512.zip *******
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