Lifting his nose in the eye of the sun,
    Waved he his hand to his wary progenitor;
  Higher and higher he banked and he spun,
    Mounting aloft as away from his ken he tore. 
  “Who’s this,” said Phoebus, “my kingdom affronts? 
    Doubtless, young fellow, your conduct you think witty;
  I’ll find a method of stopping your stunts;
    Dear shall you pay for precocious propinquity.” 
  Forth shot his beams ere the flier detected ’em,
  Melting the wax on his wings (that connected ’em).

  Down to the depths of the bottomless sea
    Icarus crashed with a lightning celerity,
  Leaving a name for the ages to be. 
    “Ha!” chortled Phoebus, “that comes of temerity.” 
  See from the sequel the fitness of things: 
    Nearly forgotten this early adventure is;
  Phoebus is beaten; Time’s whirligig brings
    Still its revenge in the course of the centuries. 
  Over the sky, from the east to the west of it,
  Man has decidedly now got the best of it.

  R.A.F.

* * * * *

TO PSYCHICAL MEDIUMS.

Extract from a tradesman’s circular:—­

    “Mr. ——­, who has just been disembodied, hopes to call quite
    shortly and will, we trust, be allowed to book forward your
    Spring term requirements.”

* * * * *

    “A letter sent by a Government Department to the Hornsey Borough
    Council was so long that it was not read at all.”—­Daily Paper.

But if you think that will discourage them you don’t know our bureaucrats.

* * * * *

[Illustration:  THE FOCH-TERRIER.  “I KNOW ALL ABOUT THAT SILLY DOG IN AESOP.  I’M NOT TAKING ANY CHANCES.”]

* * * * *

ESSENCE OF PARLIAMENT.

Monday, March 3rd.—­The terrors of the Statute of Anne having been temporarily removed, Mr. AUSTEN CHAMBERLAIN headed a little queue of Ministers coming up to take the Oath.  How the already crowded Treasury Bench is to accommodate the new-comers it is difficult to see, but presumably a system of reliefs will be arranged.

The present epidemic was discussed by Captain NEWMAN and Sir JOHN REES who were not agreed as to whether port is a “preventative” or a “preventive” of influenza, but were unanimous in thinking that far too little of it was available.

[Illustration:  MR. MCCALLUM SCOTT.  “SH-H!  DON’T YOU KNOW THERE’S A DEMOBILISATION ON?”]

On bearing that the liability of agricultural shows to the Entertainment Tax depended on whether instruction was combined with amusement, Colonel WEIGALL pertinently asked who was to decide where amusement ends and education begins.  Talking of education, I shall in future, following Mr. H.A.L.  FISHER, try to pronounce Thibetan with a long “e,” but, I hesitate, even on the authority of the MINISTER OF EDUCATION, to speak of “Febuary.”