60. ... and this practice must cease forthwith.

60A. Query, Our Daily.—­What is Popocatapetl?  Is it an indoor game, a cannibal tribe, a curative herb, or neither?  Solutions are invited.

There are two very advantageous points about this scheme:  (1) The ingenious system of numbering would avoid interference with army routine, which must go on:  and (2) men might be encouraged to read Regimental Orders.

This suggestion is made without hope of fee or reward.  Its author does not even ask for extra duty pay.

* * * * *

[Illustration:  HIS STOCK-IN-TRADE.

Tramp.  “CAN YOU SPARE A PORE OLD GENTLEMAN THE PRICE OF A CUP OF KORFEE.  SIR?”

Sub. (in high spirits).  “RIGHT-O.  ALL THE COFFEE YOU WANT AND THE PRICE OF A SHAVE AND A HAIR-CUT AS WELL.”

Tramp.  “WILL YER?  THEN WHO’S A-GOIN’ TO KEEP ME WHILE MY ‘AIR AN’ BEARD GROWS AGAIN?".]

* * * * *

A FINE EAR FOR THE HASPIRATE.

“I wish ’as ’ow I warn’t married.”

Mr. Punt crooned out the impious aspiration as he sorted a judicious modicum of hemp into the canary seed.  He spoke in semi-soliloquy, yet quite loud enough to reach the vigilant ear of Mrs. Punt, who was dusting the cages at the other end of the live-stock store.  She said nothing in reply, but her eye fixed itself upon him with a glint eloquent of what she might say later.

“Why is that, Mr. Punt?” I asked encouragingly.

“Why, it’s on’y to-day, Sir, as I met a lidy, a widder lidy, friend o’ Uncle George’s down Putney way, as ‘as one leg, a nice little bit o’ ’ouse property and two great hauk’s eggs.”

It did seem a rare combination of marriageable qualities.  I asked the value of a great auk’s egg, and was surprised to learn that a specimen had recently been sold at auction for something like three hundred pounds.  I inquired whether all the great auks’ eggs that came on the market were genuine, or whether “faked” specimens were to be met with.  I had heard, I thought, of “faked” eagles’ eggs.

“Different kind o’ bird altogether, Sir, and different kind o’ egg.  Can’t very well be imitated.  You didn’t think as I said great ’awk, Sir?” he asked very anxiously.

“No, no; I understand,” I hastened to assure him.

“The ‘awk, Sir, is a bird o’ the heagle kind; the hauk’s a different kind altogether—­web-footed, aquatic—­was, I should rather say, seeing as ’ow ’e’s un appily extinct.  Hauk and ’awk, Sir—­you take the difference?”

I said that I thought the distinction was perceptible to a fine ear for the aspirate.