* * * * *

RUS IN URBE.

["Encouraged by the summer weather yesterday, a titled lady took her tea with some friends on the footway at Belsize Park Gardens, Hampstead.  Unsympathetic passers-by, however, complained of the obstruction ... and, following representation to the police by the public, the al-fresco tea-party was broken up.”—­Daily News.]

In spite of the innate conservatism of the police we are pleased to think that the seeds of a happy unconventionality, sown by this courageous lady of title, have already borne fruit.

On Thursday night, about ten o’clock, the attention of passers-by was drawn to a four-post bed, which was being trundled along the Strand by eight stalwart footmen.  On it reposed the Duke of Sleepyacres.  It appears that his Grace, on return from active service, found that the confined air of an ordinary bed-room engendered insomnia.  He therefore conceived the idea of sleeping in the open-air and caused his bed to be placed in the centre of the Strand, opposite the entrance to the Savoy Hotel.  The presence of the sleeping nobleman might have been unnoticed, had not Mr. SMILLIE chanced to pass the spot on his way from dining after a session of the Coal Commission.  His eye was immediately caught by the ducal crest on the panels of the bed.  Suspicious that this was a dastardly attempt on the part of a member of the landed classes to obtain sleeping-rights in a public thoroughfare, Mr. SMILLIE lodged a complaint with the police, and the Duke was removed to Bow Street.

Some mild interest has been displayed by the public in a camp which has been established by three subalterns in the roadway at the corner of Charing Cross and Northumberland Avenue.  It is a small and quite inconspicuous affair, consisting merely of an army pattern bell-tent, a camp fire and a few deck chairs.  Our representative recently visited the occupants to ascertain the reason for their presence.  After hastily declining an offer of a glass of E.F.C. port, smuggled over from France, he inquired with polite interest whether his hosts contemplated a lengthy stay.  They replied that they did.  They were waiting for their demobilisation gratuities.  The locality, they added, was a quiet one, where advancing old age could be met in comfortable meditation.  Also the offices of Messrs. Cox, Box & Co., the Regimental Agents, were in convenient proximity, and the latest news of the gratuities could be obtained with a minimum of trouble.  Up to the present the police have not interfered with them, apparently taking them for workmen employed in repairing the roadway.

* * * * *

AT THE PLAY.

“KISSING TIME.”

For an infrequent worshipper at the shrine of Musical Comedy the atmosphere of a first night at a new, or renascent, theatre is perhaps rather too heady.  There are so many potent vintages set on the board; so many connoisseurs who will offer to tell you beforehand of the merits of their favourite brands.