the calm of heifer or bull,

And send them snorting round the croft

With eyes of fear and tails aloft.

Till every warble-fly be floored

Whitehall will never sheathe the sword.

The Growth of Impropriety.

"Her hair is always exquisitely dressed, and her shoes in perfect shape. No more in the way of dress is required of any woman."

Daily Mirror.

"PROPOSED IMPROVEMENT OF A DANGEROUS CORONER."
Headline in Provincial Paper.

The best plan, possibly, would be to get the jury to sit on him.

NEWSPAPER HEADINGS POPULARLY ILLUSTRATED.

"INFLUENZA MICROBE DISCOVERED AT A LONDON HOSPITAL."

MRS. BLOGGINS'S STATEMENT.

It is not too much to say that bed-making circles in Cambridge have been agitated to their utmost depths by the recent advent of some hundreds of American youths who have come to pursue certain courses of study within the University walls. Let us make one thing perfectly clear. Bed-makers do not object to Americans as Americans, but this avalanche of Transatlantics arrives on the very eve of the vacation, just when the bed-makers are packing off the contingent of young Naval officers who have been making things hum during the past term.

Persuaded that their too-brief holidays will be entirely absorbed in attending to the Americans, the bed-makers urge with some justice that they too are entitled to enjoy the beautiful things of this enchanting world quite as much as miners and railway-men. We understand that meetings of their Association are being held, and that the University authorities are faced by a situation which is rapidly passing beyond their control. Bed-makers are amongst the most loyal members of the community, but they feel, as a prominent member of the profession put it, that "the last camel breaks the straw's back," and they are determined to uphold their immemorial rights.

We have thought it our duty therefore to interview the celebrated Mrs. Bloggins, the doyenne of the Corps of Bed-makers of Trinity College. We found the lady in her home in Paradise Walk, where she was engaged in eating some excellent buttered toast. We lost no time in explaining the purport of our visit.

"We desire to know, Mrs. Bloggins," we began, "what your feelings are with regard to the Americans."

"Ah," said Mrs. Bloggins, speaking with deep emotion, "you may well call 'em Americans, for I've never bin so troubled about anythink before. Some people seem to git the notion into their 'eads that bed-makers do no work. Why we're arst to slave from mornin' till night, and our pay is paltry. Things in Cambridge isn't like what they was. Time was when our young gentlemen used to 'ave big dinners in their rooms, and a careful bed-maker could save a bone or two. Nowadays they,'re only cheese-parers, that's what I call 'em. You won't believe me, I know, but my mother, who was a bed-maker afore me, used to 'ave a month at the seaside every year, all paid for out of money give to 'er by 'er young gentlemen. To be sure there was a wrangler, or somethink of that kind, who didn't come up to the mark, so she soon got rid of 'im; 'e used to find 'is butter was took by the cat, and accidents of that kind.

"Mind yer," she continued, "I ain't got nothink to say against the Americans. They may be the most liberal-'earted gentlemen in the world for all I know. But it's the principle of the thing I'm objectin' to. It's a case of kill me quick or cure me to-morrow, and if President WILSON was to talk till next week 'e couldn't make it no different. You can't make a silk sock out of a side of bacon, and that's true whichever way you look at it."

"But what steps," we urged, "does your Association intend to take, Mrs. Bloggins, over this matter?"

"I don't know nothink about no 'sociations," said Mrs. Bloggins, "but I do know that we're all in it, and Mrs. Pledger and Mrs. 'Uggins, and the rest of 'em, we knows our power and we intends to use it."

"In what way do you mean?" I said.

She looked at me cunningly.

"Now you're spyin'. It's dirty work and I won't 'ave it 'ere. You might be the Proctor hisself for all I cares—you're not going to ferret nothink out of me."

Hereupon she rose with great dignity and plainly indicated that the interview was at an end.

La Haute Cuisine.

"Cook; French; age 38; wages £25-£30 week."—Morning Post.

TO THE DEATH.

[According to the papers, two Frenchmen have agreed to fight a duel in aeroplanes.]

"Cauliflower!" shrieked Gaspard Volauvent across the little table in the estaminet. His face bristled with rage.

"Serpent!" replied Jacques Rissolo, bristling with equal dexterity.

The two stout little men glared ferociously at each other. Then Jacques picked up his glass and poured the wine of the country over his friend's head.

"Drown, serpent!" he said magnificently. He beckoned to the waiter. "Another bottle," he said. "My friend has drunk all this."

Gaspard removed the wine from his whiskers with the local paper and leant over the table towards Jacques.

"This must be wiped out in blood," he said slowly. "You understand?"

"Perfectly," replied the other. "The only question is whose."

"Name your weapons," said Gaspard Volauvent grandly.

"Aeroplanes," replied Jacques Rissole after a moment's thought.

"Bah! I cannot fly."

"Then I win," said Jacques simply.

The other looked at him in astonishment.

"What! You fly?"

"No; but I can learn."

"Then I will learn too," said Gaspard with dignity. "We meet—in six months?"

"Good." Jacques pointed to the ceiling. "Say three thousand feet up."

"Three thousand four hundred," said Gaspard for the sake of disagreeing.

"After all, that is for our seconds to arrange. My friend Épinard of the Roullens Aerodrome will act for me. He will also instruct me how to bring serpents to the ground."

"With the idea of cleansing the sky of cauliflowers," said Gaspard, "I shall proceed to the flying-ground at Dormancourt; Blanchaille, the instructor there, will receive your friend."

He bowed and walked out.

Details were soon settled. On a date six months ahead the two combatants would meet three thousand two hundred feet above the little town in which they lived, and fight to the death. In the event of both crashing, the one who crashed last would be deemed the victor. It was Gaspard's second who insisted on this clause; Gaspard himself felt that it did not matter.

The first month of instruction went by. At the end of it Jacques Rissole had only one hope. It was that when he crashed he should crash on some of Gaspard's family. Gaspard had no hope, but one consolation. It was that no crash could involve his stomach, which he invariably left behind him as soon as the aeroplane rose.

At the end of the second month Gaspard wrote to Jacques.

"My friend," he wrote, "the hatred of you which I nurse in my bosom, and which fills me with the desire to purge you from the sky, is in danger of being transferred to my instructor. Let us therefore meet and renew our enmity."

Jacques Rissole wrote back to Gaspard.

"My enemy," he wrote, "there is nobody in the whole of the Roullens aerodrome whom I do not detest with a detestation beside which my hatred for you seems as