To inquire why the bare mention of the mother of a man’s wife should excite merriment is to find oneself instantly deep in sociology—­and in some of its seamiest strata too.  While exploring them one would make the odd discovery that, whereas the humour that surrounds and saturates the idea of a wife possessing a maternal relative is inexhaustible, there is nothing laughable about the mother of a husband.  A wife can talk of her husband’s mother all day and never have the reputation of a wit, whereas her husband has but to mention her mother and he is the rival of the Robeys.

As for fathers-in-law, low comedians would starve if they had to depend on the help that fathers-in-law give them.  Fathers-in-law do not exist.  Nor do brothers-in-law or sisters-in-law, except as facts; but the joke is that they can be far more interfering (interference being at the root of the matter, I take it) than anyone in the world.  It is the brother-in-law who knows of absolutely safe gilt-edged investments (which rarely succeed), and has to be helped while waiting for something to turn up; it is the sister-in-law who is so firmly convinced that dear Clara (her brother’s wife) is spoiling the children.  But both escape; while many really charming old ladies, to whom their sons-in-law are devoted, continue to be riddled by the world’s satirical bullets.

What is to be done about it?  Nothing.  Only the destruction of the institution of marriage could affect it.

E. V. L.

* * * * *

=MY APOLOGIA.=

(Lines accidentally omitted from a notorious volume of Memoirs.)

  If life is dull and day by day
    I see that wittier, wiser
  England where I was wont to play
  (Being as bold as I was gay)
  Keep passing rapidly away
    All through the German KAISER;

  If “Souls” are not the things they were,
    If caste declines and Vandals
  Go practically everywhere
  From Cavendish to Berkeley Square,
  And dowdy frumps without the “air”
    Monopolise the scandals;

  There is but one thing left to do—­
    And what’s a sporting flutter worth
  Unless one takes a risk or two?—­
  “I’ll shock the world,” I thought, “anew,”
  And (ultimately) did so through
    The firm of THORNTON BUTTERWORTH.

  Two worlds indeed.  The mighty West
    Poured out her untold money
  To gaze upon my palimpsest;
  I think that Codex A was best,
  But parts of this have been suppressed;
    Publishers are so funny.

  And now my fame through London rings
    In well-bred speech and argot;
  At mild suburban tea-makings
  The postman knocks, and poor dear things
  Tear wildly at the parcel-strings
    When MUDIE gives them MARGOT.

  Pressmen have tried to make a lot
    Out of a certain instance
  Of mild misstatement as to what
  Happened in 1914.  Rot! 
  All I can say is that my plot
    Has much more verve than WINSTON’S.