“A hospital nurse interrupted evidence given in Portuguese at
    Thames Police Court on Saturday.”—­Provincial Paper.

Very rude of her.

* * * * *

“An experimental air service for Army mails only was begun a few days ago between Folkestone and Boulogne, with intermediate points in Belgium, said Mr. Illingworth, Postmaster-General.”—­Daily Chronicle.

“We are a long way yet from the mastery of the air.  Out of fifteen days the Prime Minister’s Paris postbag, which it had been arranged should be sent ‘via aloft,’ had to go by the old land and water route in fourteen days.”—­Daily Mirror.

Even that, we suppose, was quicker than to send it by the circuitous air-route via Belgium.

* * * * *

“Section-Commander ——­, who has had charge of the ——­ Special Constabulary since their inception, has been presented by the members with a Sheraton clock at a wind-up dinner.”—­Local Paper.

It was, of course, the clock that had the wind up, not the Section-Commander.

* * * * *

    “FOREIGN DIPLOMATS TAKE TO PRESIDENT.  His Ability in Dealing
    with Them Exceeds the Most Sanguinary Expectations.”—­New
    York Times.

We shall have to revise our conception of Mr. WILSON as a man of peace.

* * * * *

[Illustration:  Rearguard Officer of Demobilization (collecting stragglers on route-march). “WHAT THE DOOCE ARE YOU?” Straggler._ “I’M WOT T’ MULES BROKE AWAY FROM."_]

* * * * *

THE PATRIOT’S REWARD.

  Narcissus, in that fateful hour
    When Britain’s belt was tightly buckled
  Against the prowling U-boat’s power,
    Thou earnest to us newly suckled;
  And oh! if interest ties the knot
    That binds us to our fellow-creatures,
  Be sure we loved thee on the spot,
    My pigling with the pensive features.

  No niggard hand it was that found
    Thy punctual fare, nor short the measure
  Of garbage brought from miles around
    And meal that cost its weight in treasure;
  But ever as the U-boat u’d
    And lunch grew relatively lighter
  We filled thee up with wholesome food
    And watched thy tensile skin grow tighter.

  Artless as is the wanton faun
    And agile as the Hooluck gibbon,
  The children “walked” thee on the lawn,
    Tied with a bow of orange ribbon;
  And aye as irksomer grew the task
    Of fending off the Hun garotters
  In our mind’s eye—­if you must ask—­
    We ate thee up from tail to trotters.

  But Fate, as oft, declined to pour
    Our cup of grief till it was quite full;
  You scarce had turned your seventh score
    When straightway Fritz became less frightful;
  And argosies came home to port
    As safe as though some inland lake on,
  Laden from keel to groaning thwart
    With tender ham and toothsome bacon.