CHARIVARIA.

“Germany,” says Count RANTZAU, “cannot be treated as a second-rate nation.”  Not while it is represented by tenth-rate noblemen.

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People are now asking who the General is who has threatened not to write a book about the War?

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On Sunday week, at Tallaght, Co.  Dublin, seven men attacked a policeman.  The campaign for a brighter Sunday is evidently not wanted in Ireland.

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The United States Government is sending a Commission to investigate industrial conditions in the British Isles.  Mr. Lloyd George, we understand, has courteously offered to try to keep one or two industries going until the Commission arrives.

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“Everything that happened more than a fortnight ago,” says Mr. George Bernard Shaw in The Daily News, “always is forgotten in this land of political trifling.”  We must draw what comfort we can from the reflection that Mr. Shaw himself happened more than a fortnight ago.

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“Margarine,” says an official notice, “can be bought anywhere after to-day.”  This is not the experience of the man who entered an ironmonger’s shop and asked for a couple of feet of it.

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A woman who threatened to murder a neighbour was fined one shilling at Chertsey.  We shudder to think what it would have cost her if she had actually carried out her threat.

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A contemporary refers to “those abominable face-masks” now being worn in London.  Can this be a revival of the late Mr. RICHARDSON’S campaign against the wearing of whiskers?

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“A Court of Justice is not a place of amusement,” said Mr. Justice Roche at Manchester Assizes.  Mr. Justice darling’s rejoinder is eagerly awaited.

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We are informed by “Hints for the Home,” that “Salsify may be lifted during the next few days.”  So may Susan, if you don’t watch out.

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So many safes have been stolen from business premises in London that one enterprising man has hit upon the novel idea of putting a notice on his safe, “Not to be Taken Away.”

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A sapper of the Royal Engineers who climbed the steeple of a parish church and reached the clock told the local magistrates that he wanted to see the dial.  That, of course, is no real excuse in these days of cheap wrist-watches.

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By order of the Local Government Board influenza has been made a notifiable disease.  We sincerely hope that this will be a lesson to it.

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An evening paper suggests that the Albert Hall should be purchased by the nation.  We understand, however, that our contemporary has been forestalled by a gentleman who has offered to take it on the condition that a bathroom (h. and c.) is added.