PUNCH,
OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI.

VOLUME 147.

December 23, 1914.

CHARIVARIA.

An exceptionally well-informed Berlin newspaper has discovered that, owing to the war, Ireland is suffering from a horse famine, and many of the natives are now to be seen driving cattle.

An appeal is being made in Germany for cat-skins for the troops. In their Navy, on the other hand, they often get the cat itself.

In offering congratulations to the "Green Howards" on the work they have been doing at the Front, Major-General Capper said, "I knew it was a regiment I could hang my hat on at any time of the day or night." The expression is perhaps a little unfortunate; it sounds as if they had been pegging out.

Private F. Nailor, of the Royal Berkshires, was at his home at Sandhurst last week when the postman brought a letter from the War Office reporting that he had been killed in action. While his being alive is, of course, in these circumstances an act of gross insubordination, the Army Council will, we understand, content itself with an intimation that it must not happen again.

A cigar presented by the Kaiser to Lord Lonsdale has been sold at Henley in aid of the local Red Cross Hospital, and has become the property of a butcher at the price of £14 10s. Will it, we wonder, now be inscribed, "From a brother butcher"?

According to the Berliner Tageblatt Western Australia is interning her alien enemies on "Rottnest Island." If there is anything in a name, this does seem a rather unhappy choice, in view of the well-known sensitiveness of the German.

It is curious how in war time really important occurrences are apt to escape one's notice. For example, it was not until we read an article in a contemporary last week on "The Demise of the Slim Skirt" that we realised that Fat Skirts were now the vogue.

Of all forms of cruelty the most hideous is that which is perpetrated on defenceless little children, and we hear with regret that the Register of Births in Liverpool now includes the following names:—Kitchener Ernest Pickles, Jellicoe Jardine, French Donaldson, and Joffre Venmore.

With reference to our recent remarks about Mr. J. Ward's so-called mixed metaphor of a horse bolting with money, a gentlemen writes to us from Epsom to say that he has personally put money on more than one horse which bolted.

The War would certainly seem to have led to better feeling in the Labour world between masters and men, and from a recent paragraph in The Daily Mail we learn that there is now a London Association of Master Decorators. The idea is a pretty one. Iron Crosses, perhaps?

The War has worked other wonders. Not the least of these, a Stock Exchange friend points out, is that lots of Bulls and Bears are now comrades in arms.

"New Phase in Russia.
Germans changing their dispositions."

Daily Mail.

We are glad to hear this, for they used to have simply beastly ones.

Orderly. "Your Majesty, I have been sent to ask for detailed instructions about the Christmas dinner to be held at Buckingham Pal——"

Wilhelm.——!——!!

Another secret revealed by Mr. Hamilton Fyfe:—

"As usual when they take the initiative, the Russian troops swept the enemy before them. They first cleared out the trenches and then pursued the Germans."—Daily Mail.

In the West we still cling to the old-fashioned method of first clearing out the Germans and then pursuing the trenches.

SOME LITERARY WAR-NOTES.

Messrs. Harrap have just brought out William the Silent. This is not a biography of the Kaiser.

Nor is The Hound of Heaven, a new edition of which is announced by Messrs. Chatto and Windus.

Mr. Edward Cressy's Discoveries and Inventions of the Twentieth Century makes no mention, curiously enough, of the Wolff Bureau. We look in vain, too, among the Yuletide publications for a book of Fairy Tales by William Hohenzollern. This does not speak well for the alertness of our publishers.

Messrs. Jack, we see, have produced a Life of Nelson. It is now, we consider, up to Messrs. Nelson to produce a volume with some such title as We All Love Jack.

At last the Germans are reported to have scored a little success in the United States. An American coon is said to have been so much impressed by the achievements of the Germans that he has sent a song to the Kaiser, the opening words of which are "My Hunny!"

The War is responsible for a splendid boom in the study of geography. An English lady who visited some of the Belgian wounded at a certain London hospital the other day asked one of them where he was hit, and on receiving the reply, "Au pied," is said to have spent hours trying to find the place on the map.

Which reminds us that, owing to the new names which the various belligerents are giving to towns which they have conquered (like Lemberg) or temporarily occupied (like Ostend), several map-makers are reported to be suffering from nervous breakdown.

The Kaiser's Thanks.

"The Archbishop of York and Germany."

Heading in "Edinburgh Evening Despatch."

Other pluralists, like the Bishop of Sodor and Man, are not at all jealous, nor are we at all surprised.

"They drank the full-flavoured soup with scarcely a sound."—The Story-Teller.

Another example of true British refinement.

THE OLD SEA-ROVER SPEAKS.

[Referring to our victory off the Falkland Islands, the Tägliche Rundschau remarks: "On board our North Sea ships our sailors will clench their teeth and all hearts will burn with the feeling, 'England the enemy! Up and at the enemy!'" The gallant bombardment of defenceless towns on our East Coast would appear to be the immediate outcome of this intelligent attitude.]

Behind your lock-gates stowed away,

Out of the great tides' ebb and flow,

How could you guess, this many a day,

Who was your leading naval foe?

But now you learn, a little late—

So loud the rumours from the sea grow—

England's the thing you have to hate,

And not (for instance) Montenegro.

The facts are just as you've been told;

Further disguise would be but vain;

We have a penchant from of old

For being masters on the main;

It is a custom which we caught

From certain sea-kings who begat us,

And that is why we like the thought

That you propose to "up and at" us.

Come where you will—the seas are wide;

And choose your Day—they're all alike;

You'll find us ready where we ride

In calm or storm and wait to strike;

But—if of shame your shameless Huns

Can yet retrieve some casual traces—

Please fight our men and ships and guns,

Not women-folk and watering-places.

O. S.

UNWRITTEN LETTERS TO THE KAISER.

No. XI.

(From the German Crown Prince.)

Most Internally (innigst) beloved Father,—Here in my headquarters we learnt with sorrow that you have been suffering from a bronchial catarrh. Anxious as we were at first, our minds were relieved when we heard that you had behaved very violently to those about you, for in that we recognised our good old father as we knew him from long since, and we said to ourselves that you could not fail soon to be in the saddle again with all your accustomed energy. And now comes the report that you are indeed yourself again, like Richard III, in our great German, Shakspeare.

Now that all danger is past I cannot forbear giving you from my heart a word of warning, begging you not with rashness to risk your so valuable life. Do not laugh and imagine that I am pulling your leg (dass ich Dir das Bein ziehe). Nothing is further from my thoughts; I am quite serious. You must remember that you are not so young as you were and that this rushing to and fro between France and Poland, which to a man of my age would be a mere trifle, bringing with it only enjoyment, must be for a man who is between fifty and sixty a task well calculated to search out and expose his corporeally weak points so as to bring satisfaction, not to us, but to the enemy. Such a burden must no longer be placed only upon your back, for there are others whose bones are young and who are willing to share it with you. Why should we be compelled to sit still or merely to beat our back with fists while you, dear Father, undergo these too terrible fatigues? I myself, for instance, if I may say so with the most humble respect, am ready to represent you in all departments whenever you call upon me. I can scatter any number of Iron Crosses, and am willing to make speeches which will prove to our hated enemies, as well as to America and Italy, that God is the good old friend of our Hohenzollern family and that He will pay no attention (why should He?) to anything that the English, the French, the Russians, the Servians and the Belgians may say. Is it not lucky for the Austrians and the Turks that they are on our side and can share in the high protection that we enjoy? To save you trouble I would even go so far as to open a session of the Reichstag, though for my own part I never could see much use in that absurd institution. Still we have it now under our thumb (unter unserem Daumen), and even the Socialists are ready to feed out of our hands and to allow us to kick them about the floor. He who says that war is barbarous and useless can learn by this example that it is not so. If you wish me to invite one or two Socialists (not more) to a State dinner I will even go so far as that. You see how deeply prepared I am to oblige you. And if you want to finish your cure by taking a complete rest from the serious work of being Commander-in-Chief, even in that point I am not unwilling to sacrifice myself to the highest interests of the Fatherland by replacing your august person both in the field and in the council chamber. You have only to say the word and I shall be there.

May I now add a few words about the War? Somehow it does not seem that we are getting on as we have been led to expect. Mind, I am not blaming anybody, certainly not your most gracious fatherly Majesty, but I must say that all the books which we were told to read showed us quite a different war, a war laid out on the system of 1870. At this stage, in 1870, everything was over except the siege of Paris and the shouting, but now we do not appear to be making progress anywhere. Why do these degenerate races hold back our holy and with-love-of-Fatherland-inspired troops? Perhaps the new Moltke has not been quite so sure in his touch or so triumphant in his plans as the old one—but then that ought not to have made much difference, because you and I have been there to keep him straight. Falkenhayn, no doubt, might have been expected to do better, for you had opened your whole mind to him, but he too seems only able to knock his head against a stone wall (seinen Kopf gegen eine Mauer stossen) and the result is that we are everywhere getting it in the neck (dass wir es überall in dem Hals kriegen), and that process is not pleasant for a true Hohenzollern. It is possible that Rupert of Bavaria has been allowed to talk too much. One Crown Prince is enough even for a German army. Have you any idea what we ought to do to secure victory somewhere?

I am sending you a box of lozenges, which I have always found excellent for a cough. I beg also that you will not forget how efficacious is flannel when worn next to the skin.

Your most devoted Son,

Wilhelm, Kronprinz.

SEASONABLE GIFTS.

I. The Mottle.

A new and ingenious development of the old-fashioned hot-water bottle. The ordinary hot-water bottle warms but a small portion of the bed. The Mottle, possessing a motor attachment, can be wound up and it will then travel all over the bed, diffusing an agreeable warmth everywhere. May be used as an engine in the nursery by day. 33s. 6d. The Chesterton, for large-size beds, 44s. 11d. This kind also makes an excellent gift for soldiers in the trenches. It will travel half-a-mile before requiring further petrol.

FULFILMENT.

Austria. "I SAID ALL ALONG THIS WAS GOING TO BE A PUNITIVE EXPEDITION."

LIGHT REFRESHMENT: AN INTERLUDE.

By Special Constable XXX.

I was sitting grimly in my sentry-box guarding a power station and a sausage factory. The latter is considered to be a likely point of attack on the part of the Huns. Should it be destroyed, a vital source of food supply for our army (they would reason) would be cut off.

Incidentally, the sausage factory is much more exciting to guard than the electric light works. One sees the raw material arriving and being unloaded. One sees the sausage king swishing up in his richly-appointed limousine, giving porkly orders to his deferential subordinates, and then whisking off—no doubt to confer with the War Office.

An old lady with a million wrinkles approached me and seemed desirous of entering into conversation. We are strictly forbidden to talk with civilians unless first accosted. After that it is a matter for individual discretion.

I therefore left it to her to make the first advance. She began: "'Ave you got to sit there the 'ole of the afternoon, dearie?"

I confirmed that apprehension.

"Well, I do call it a shame; and you looking so blue with the cold."

With that I was in cordial agreement.

"Are they going to bring you tea, dearie, at 'arf-time?"

Alas, no. Under sergeant's sanction we might be permitted to buy a pork-pie from opposite, but this must be taken as unofficial and in confidence.

"What are you waiting for?" she asked.

"Zeppelins, Madam," I replied.

"Zeppelins—what would they be?"

She nodded a vigorous understanding of my explanation.

"And when they drop their nasty bombs, what will you do then, dearie?"

Our orders were to draw our truncheons, arrest them and convey them to the nearest police-station. I made this very clear.

"And what do you think they will do to them?"

I considered that they would get at least a month with hard labour, and no option of a fine.

"I should think so! The brutes—trying to take away the poor man's food! And as for that Crown Prince, when you get 'im, just you 'it 'im right over the 'ead with your truncheon!"

We are not allowed to hit over the head on ordinary occasions, but in the case of the Crown Prince attacking (and conceivably looting) our sausage factory, no doubt the rule would be relaxed. I undertook to follow her advice, and she left greatly relieved.

A CAPTURE.

Even without his khaki I should have known the wee lieutenant for an infant in arms, and I began to hope, directly I had been detached by our hostess to cover his left wing, that he was that happy warrior for whom I was seeking. He saw me looking at the red ribbon which adorned the left wing in question and which our gardener's wife told me the other day was "a poor trumpery sort of thing if Kitchener meant it as an honour to them."

"I'm not a kicker," he assured me, and I let him talk inoculation happily until we commenced to move forward in files.

"You live here, don't you?" he said as soon as Maria (not black) had served us with soup, and when I assented his next remark made me hopeful.

"And you know all the people round here, I suppose?"

"Nearly everyone I should think within five miles of the village."

"I've been here a fortnight and this is the first time I have been out—not out-of-doors, of course—I mean meeting people."

At that moment my neighbour upon the left commenced a bombardment which interrupted us but, when a pause came at last, the wee lieutenant broke it in a low and solemn voice.

"I suppose you couldn't tell me why a deaf man can't tickle nine children?"

So suddenly had matters come to a head that I sat staring, and the wee lieutenant, misunderstanding my interest, grew red.

"I'm not mad, really and truly, but that thing is positively getting on my brain. I'm not very keen on riddles and so forth, but I happened to hear someone ask that one the other day, and I didn't catch the answer. Somehow it has worried me ever since. Why can't he tickle them?"

I shook my head. "I never saw anybody attempt it, deaf or otherwise. Hadn't you better ask the person who propounded the question?"

"I—I can't very well—I wish I could. I thought, if you knew the answer to the riddle, you might know the person who asked it. It's very hard to get to know people by yourself, isn't it?"

I lured him into the open. "How did you come to hear it?"

He pondered in silence for a moment with his frank eyes bent upon his plate.

"I don't mind telling you, but I shouldn't like everyone to know; they might think me a bit of a fool."

I promised discretion.

"Well, the other morning I was up on the common kicking a football about with some of the men—it's good for them and keeps them from getting too much beer, and I like it myself—football, I mean, not beer—and some people came and sat down to watch on the roller, and there was a Yellow Jersey among them."

"But what a curious place for a cow—on a roller."

The wee lieutenant twinkled. "And she was rather nice, you know."

I nodded, thinking to myself that this young man would never make "an Eye-Witness with Headquarters," whatever else the fortunes of war might bring him.

"Well, that evening we were out scouting, trying to find out where a party of cavalry had got to that had been reported coming out from King's Langley to take us by surprise, and when I got to a cottage with its blinds down and a light inside I peeped in, and there were two or three people, and she was there, and, of course, I had to knock to ask if any cavalry had gone by."

"And she didn't come to the door!"

"No, you're right there; somebody else did, but I heard my one—I mean the Jersey one—I mean the Yellow one—ask somebody that riddle; but the person—the sister or whatever she was who came to the door—finished me off before I heard the answer, and somehow or other it's been running through my head ever since. It isn't the girl, you know, it's—it's the aggravation of it. I asked our sergeant the other day and he doesn't know. One of these days I shall be giving it as an order—'Deaf section! Tickle nine children!' Do you—do you know who lives in that cottage?"

"Nobody."

"But she—they were there that night."

"Yes, but they don't really live there. We call them the Swallows because they migrate so much. Baby Swallow is very pretty, isn't she? and, by-the-by, she's rather afraid that you may be worrying about that riddle."

"Me—I?"

This was the moment for which I had been waiting, but the wee lieutenant took cover, hunting his dessert fork on the floor long after Maria had brought up reinforcements.

"Why, yes, she ought to have said, 'dumb,' not 'deaf.' I've forgotten the answer—something about 'gesticulate.' She's coming to tea with me to-morrow. Would you like me to ask her what the answer is, and write it down for you?"

Our hostess gave the signal for our half company to retire, the other half to stay down in the smoke, and I added, as I went out, "That will lay the riddle nicely, won't it? If it had been the girl and not the aggravation, I should have asked you to tea too."

The wee lieutenant surrendered at that, blushing above the door-handle.

"I—I—I say, I should like to get the answer first-hand. Won't you ask me to tea, please?"

I don't yet know what it feels like to capture a prisoner of war, but that's how I assisted at the taking of a prisoner of love.

The Jester. "Hallo, Sonny! Choosin' yer turkey?"

Diminutive Patriot. "Garn! Yer don't catch me 'avin' turkey these days. Wy, I'd as soon eat a German sausage!"

KEEPING IN THE LIMELIGHT.

It was a grand meeting of the literary gents. They had all heard about the War from their publishers, and there had been one or two suggestive allusions in The Author. The question of the moment was, "How can we help?" The chairman was the President of the Society of Authors, who knew everybody by sight.

The first to rise was Mr. Harold Begbie, but he failed to catch the Chairman's eye, which had been secured by Mr. H. G. Wells. This well-known strategist rose to point out that what England wanted in the event of an invasion was the man, the gun and the trench. When he said man he meant an adult male of the human species. A gun was a firearm from which bullets were discharged by an explosion of gunpowder. A trench, he averred, amid loud protests from the ex-Manager of the Haymarket Theatre, was a long narrow cut in the earth. He had already pointed out these facts to the War Office, but had received no reply. Apparently Earl Kitchener required time for the information to soak in. Was it or was it not a national scandal? His new nov——(Deleted by Chairman).

After a little coaxing, Mr. Eden Phillpotts was persuaded to rise to his feet. He said deferentially in the first place that he was not a savage. (General cheering, in which might be detected a note of sincere relief.) He lived at Torquay. (Oh, oh.) He had never been to London before, and was surprised to find it such a large place. (General silence.) He had been a pacifist—(Hear, hear)—but he now thought the German Emperor was a humbug. He wished it to be known that his attitude was now one of great 'umbleness. The war could go on as far as he was concerned. (Applause.) Although he had given up writing about Dartmoor he had that morning applied for the post of Military Member of the Invasion Committee of the Torquay Division of Devonshire. (Profound sensation.) He didn't know if he should get it, but his friend, Mr. Arnold Bennett, with whom he used once to collab—— (Deleted by Chairman).

Mr. Harold Begbie then took the floor, but was interrupted by the arrival of the Military Member of the Invasion Committee of the Thorpe-le-Soken Division of Essex.

Hanging his feathered helmet on the door-peg and thrusting his sword and scabbard into the umbrella-stand, Mr. Arnold Bennett took a seat at the table, afterwards putting out his chest. Mr. Wells was observed to sink into an elaborately assumed apathy. But in his eyes was a bitter envy.

Mr. Bennett, after clearing his throat, said that he had settled the War. Everybody was to do what they were told and what that was would be told them in due course. He and the War Office had had it out. He had insisted on something being done, and the War Office, which wasn't such a fool as some authors thought (with a meaning look at Mr. Wells), had been most affable. Everything now was all right. His next book was to be a war nov—— (Deleted by Chairman).

Mr. Harold Begbie then rose to his feet simultaneously with Mr. Wm. le Queux.

Mr. Wm. le Queux said that he owned an autograph portrait of the Kaiser. It was signed "Yours with the belt, Bill." The speaker would sell it on behalf of the War Funds and humbly apologised to his brother authors for having knocked about so much in his youth with emperors and persons of that kind. It should not occur again. He pointed out that he had foretold this War, and that his famous book, The Great War of—whenever it was—was to be brought up to date in the form of —— (Deleted by Chairman).

At this juncture it was brought to the Chairman's notice that Mr. H. G. Wells was missing. An anxious search revealed the fact that the ornamental sword and plumed casque of the Military Member of the Invasion Committee of the Thorpe-le-Soken Division of Essex had disappeared at the same time, and the meeting broke up in disorder.

THE SUPREME TEST.

The Civilian. "I don't know how you do it. Fancy marchin' thirty miles with the rifle, and that pack on yer back!"

The Tommy. "Yes, and mind You—it's Tipperary all the way!">[

Our Sporting Press Again. "Sporting rifles have been bought in Paris for pheasant-shooting."—Daily News.

THE CHRISTMAS SPIRIT.

I was sitting in front of the fire—dozing, I daresay—when he was announced.

"Father Christmas."

He came in awkwardly and shook me by the hand.

"Forgive my unceremonious entry," he said. "I know I ought to have come down the chimney, but—well, you understand."

"Things are different this year," I suggested.

"Very different," he said gloomily. He put his sack down and took a seat on the other side of the fire-place.

"Anything for me?" I wondered, with an eye on the sack between us.

"Ah, there's no difference there," he said, brightening up as he drew out a big flat parcel. "The blotter from Aunt Emily. You needn't open it now; it's exactly the same as last year's."

I had been prepared for it. I took a letter from my pocket and dropped it in the sack.

"My letter of thanks for it," I explained. "Exactly the same as last year's too."

Father Christmas sighed and gazed into the fire.

"All the same," he said at last, "it's different, even with your Aunt Emily."

"Tell me all about it. To begin with, why didn't you come down the chimney?"

"The reindeer." He threw up his hands in despair. "Gone!"

"How?"

"Filleted."

I looked at him in surprise.

"Or do I mean 'billeted'?" he said. "Anyway, the War Office did it."

"Requisitioned, perhaps."

"That's it. They requisitioned 'em. What you and I would call taking 'em."

"I see. So you have to walk. But you could still come down the chimney."

"Well, I could; but it would mean climbing up there first. And that wouldn't seem so natural. It would make it more like a practical joke, and I haven't the heart for practical jokes this year, when nobody really wants me at all."

"Not want you?" I protested. "What rubbish!"

Father Christmas dipped his hand into his sack and brought out a card of greeting. Carefully adjusting a pair of horn spectacles to his nose he prepared to read.

"Listen to this," he said. "It's from Alfred to Eliza." He looked at me over his glasses. "I don't know if you know them at all?"

"I don't think so."

"An ordinary printed card with robins and snow and so forth on it. And it says"—his voice trembled with indignation—"it says, 'Wishing you a very happy——' Censored, Sir! Censored, at my time of life. There's your War Office again."

"I think that's a joke of the publisher's," I said soothingly.

"Oh, if it's humour, I don't mind. Nobody is more partial to mirth and jollity than I am." He began to chuckle to himself. "There's my joke about the 'rain, dear'; I don't know if you know that?"

I said I didn't; he wanted cheering up. But though he was happy while he was telling it to me he soon became depressed again.

"Look here," I said sternly, "this is absurd of you. Christmas is chiefly a children's festival. Grown-ups won't give each other so many presents this year, but we shall still remember the children, and we shall give you plenty to do seeing after them. Why," I went on boastfully, "you've got four of my presents in there at this moment. The book for Margery, and the box of soldiers, and the Jumping Tiger and——"

Father Christmas held up his hand and stopped me.

"It's no good," he said, "you can't deceive me. After a good many years at the business I'm rather sensitive to impressions." He wagged a finger at me. "Now then, uncle. Was your whole heart in it when you bought that box of soldiers, or did you do it with an effort, telling yourself that the children mustn't be forgotten—and knowing quite well that you had forgotten them?"

"One has a—a good deal to think about just now," I said uneasily.

"Oh, I'm not blaming you; everybody's the same; but it makes it much less jolly for me, that's all. You see, I can't help knowing. Why, even your Aunt Emily, when she bought you that delightful blotter ... which you have your foot on ... even she bought it in a different way from last year's. Last year she gave a lot of happy thought to it, and decided in the middle of the night that a blotter was the one thing you wanted. This year she said, 'I suppose he'd better have his usual blotter, or he'll think I've forgotten him.' Kind of her, of course (as, no doubt, you've said in your letter), but not the jolly Christmas spirit."

"I suppose not," I said.

Father Christmas sighed again and got up.

"Well, I must be trotting along. Perhaps next year they'll want me again. Good-bye."

"Good-bye. You're quite sure there's nothing else for me?"

"Quite sure," he said, glancing into his bag. "Hallo, what's this?"

He drew out a letter. It had O.H.M.S. on it, and was addressed to "Father Christmas."

"For me? Fancy my not seeing that before. Whatever can it be?" He fixed his spectacles again and began to read.

"A commission, perhaps," I said humorously.

"It is a commission!" he cried excitedly. "To go to the Front and deliver Christmas presents to the troops! They've got hundreds of thousands all ready for them!"

"And given in what spirit?" I smiled.

"Ah, my boy! No doubt about the spirit of that." He slung his sack on to his shoulder and faced me—his old jolly self again. "This will be something like. I suppose I shall have the reindeer again for this. Did I ever tell you the joke—ah! so I did, so I did. Well, good night to you."

He hurried out of the room chuckling to himself. I sat down in front of the fire again, but in a moment he was back.

"Just thought of something very funny," he said, "Simply had to come back and tell you. The troops—hee-hee-hee—won't have any stockings to hang up, so—ha-ha-ha—they'll have to hang up their puttees! Ha-ha! Ha-ha-ha! Ha-ha-ha-ha!"

He passed through the door again, and his laughter came rolling down the passage.

A. A. M.

FOR ALL PERSONS.

THE SUPPRESSED SUPERMAN.

"What are you reading, Arthur?" I said.

"Nietzsche," said Arthur.

I sneezed in response. "Isn't that the chap," I said, "who's really responsible for the war?"

"People like you think so," he said.

"The reading of philosophy," I said, "was never in my line. Give me the exact sciences; Euclid for me every time."

"Hopelessly moth-eaten," said he. "Most of the schools have dropped him in favour of geometry."

"Bah," I said, "a quibble. But tell me, wasn't it Nietzsche who taught the Germans to think they were supermen or whatever you call 'em?"

"Contrary to the opinion of the man in the street," said Arthur, looking at me rather meaningly, "Nietzsche did not write merely for the benefit of German people, nor did he approve, I should say, of the German idea of culture. You've been reading the evening papers; you're a wallower, that's what you are."

"I'm afraid," I said, "you also consider yourself a bit of a superman."

"I admit," he said, "that I've gone a long way."

"Towards Tipperary?"

"Beyond you," he said, tapping the page of Nietzsche he was reading; "we're not on the same plane."

"You can always get out and change," I said.

"Such flippancy," said Arthur, "is unbecoming in a lance corporal. What you want is a course of philosophy."

"What you want," I said, "is a course of musketry." Arthur, who, like me, is rising forty-six, is sound enough for home defence, but isn't in any Force yet. So, being a lance corporal in the "United Arts" myself, I feel I can throw advice of this sort at him freely.

"I'm going to give you a mental prescription," he said, taking out a pencil and scribbling on an envelope. "Have you read this—Ludovici's Who is to be Master of the World?"

"No, I haven't," I said; "but I can tell you who isn't going to be—in once."

"The Japanese," said Arthur, "think a lot of it."

"I've got a pal," I said, "who'd dearly enjoy a few rounds of mental jiu-jitsu with you. He's got rather advanced ideas."

"Advanced!" said Arthur contemptuously. "We Nietzscheans speak only of being 'complete' or 'nearer completion.'"

It was at this point that Alfred joined in. He was sitting in uniform on the other side of the fire, reading Ruff's Guide.

"Who's that talking about poor old Ludovici?" he asked.

For a moment I was afraid Alfred thought that Ludovici was a horse.

"I was recommending him to this shining light of the Burlington House brigade," said Arthur.

Alfred laughed. "Look here, young fellow," he said, "everybody knows that he (pointing to me) is an antediluvian; but you've gone a bit off the boil yourself, haven't you?"

"What do you mean?" said Arthur, looking rather pained.

"Many Continental theories," said Alfred, "when they die, go to Oxford. I'm afraid your friend Ludovici's theory has been sent down even from there. Have you read Barrow's Fallacy of the Nietzschean doctrine?"

"N-no," said Arthur.

"Or Erichsen's Completion of Self? You can get the paper edition for a bob."

"I'm sorry to say I haven't," said Arthur, who looked sadly chap-fallen. "But I will. However, for the moment I've got a meeting on—our literary club, you know."

"I'm coming round to raid you one night," I said, "to see if you're all registered."

For reply Arthur slammed the door behind him.

"Alfred," I said, when Arthur had left the house, "you astound me. Who are these new friends and their philosophies, Barrow and the Danish fellow, what's his name?"

"Mere inventions," said Alfred, "but they served."

"Then the fat's in the fire," I said; "he'll find out that you've been pulling his leg before lunch-time to-morrow."

"That's all right," said Alfred. "Our lot's booked for Pirbright to-morrow morning, and we shan't meet again till the other side of Peace."

AN ECHO FROM EAST AFRICA.

Sentry (until lately behind the counter in Nairobi, to person approaching post). "Halt! Advance one, and sign the counterfoil!"

THE CHILDREN'S TRUCE.

Peace. "I'M GLAD THAT THEY, AT LEAST, HAVE THEIR CHRISTMAS UNSPOILED."