* * * * *

From a list of wedding presents:—­

    “Case of sauce ladies from Mr. W. ——.”—­Provincial Paper.

No doubt he was glad to be rid of them.

* * * * *

    “The ——­ National Kitchen has had to close down....  The great
    majority of the patrons were Army Pap Corps.”

Who presumably required only liquid refreshment.

* * * * *

    “The German Government has protested to Russia against the
    ‘criminal interference’ of olsheviks in the internal affairs
    of Germany.”—­Daily Mail.

Much correspondence will now doubtless take place, as it seems evident that the Bolsheviks have sent their initial letter in reply.

* * * * *

Getting out.

“If you belong to any of the following classes,” said the Demobilisation advertisement, “do nothing.”  So Lieut.  William Smith did nothing.

After doing nothing for some weeks he met a friend who said, “Hallo, aren’t you out yet?”

“Not yet,” said William, looking at his spurs.

“Well, you ought to do something.”

So Lieut.  William Smith decided to do something.  He was a pivotal-man and a slip-man and a one-man-business and a twenty-eight-days-in-hospital man and a W.O. letter ZXY/999 man.  Accordingly he wrote to the War Office and told them so.

It was, of course, a little confusing for the authorities.  Just as they began to see their way to getting him out as a pivotal man, somebody would decide that it was quicker to demobilise him as a one-man-business; and when this was nearly done, then somebody else would point out that it was really much neater to reinstate him as a slip-man.  Whereupon a sub-section, just getting to work at W.O. letter ZXY/999, would beg to be allowed a little practice on William while he was still available, to the great disgust of the medical authorities, who had been hoping to study the symptoms of self-demobilisation in Lieut.  Smith as evidenced after twenty-eight days’ in hospital.

Naturally, then, when another friend met William a month later and said, “Hallo, aren’t you out yet?” William could only look at his spurs again and say, “Not yet.”

“Better go to the War Office and have a talk with somebody,” said his friend.  “Much the quickest.”

So William went to the War Office.  First he had a talk with a policeman, and then he had a talk with a porter, and then he had a talk with an attendant, and then he had a talk with a messenger girl, and so finally he came to the end of a long queue of officers who were waiting to have a talk with somebody.

“Not so many here to-day as yesterday,” said a friendly Captain in the Suffolks who was next to him.

“Oh!” said William.  “And we’ve got an army on the Rhine too,” he murmured to himself, realising for the first time the extent of England’s effort.