PUNCH,
OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI.

Vol. 156.

February 12, 1919.

CHARIVARIA.

"Officers," says a recent A.C.I., "may use their public chargers for general purposes." Army circles regard this as a body blow at the taxi-sharks.

"I had a thrill the other night," writes a correspondent of The Daily Mail. "I encountered a badger on Hampstead Heath." We hesitate to think what he would have encountered if he had had two or three thrills.

The United States Immigration Bill now before Congress provides that "an alien resident may be joined by his grandfather if over fifty-five years of age." A proposal to extend the privilege to great-grandfathers who have turned their sixtieth year appears to have met with no success.

"It is highly probable," says the chief medical officer of the Local Government Board, "that masks and goggles will be necessary to ensure freedom from infection from influenza." People who refuse to adopt this simple preventative should be compelled by law to breathe exclusively through their ears.

The sensational report that the new Director-General of Housing has already found a house turns out to be unfounded. It is no secret, however, that the Department is on the track of several.

"There is a Members' cloak-room," says a contemporary in "Hints to M.P.'s," "where an attendant will take your coat and hat." So different from those other political clubs where another member usually takes them.

SHAKSPEARE on Glasgow: "For this relief much tanks.".

The salute, says a correspondent, is being reintroduced into the German Army. Kicking an officer on the parade-ground for other than political reasons is also forbidden.

The Consumers' Council urge, inter alia, "that the Food Ministry ought to be retained so long as there is any need of food control." This view is regarded as entirely too narrow by officials of the Ministry, who feel that the public is just beginning to love them for themselves alone.

A sale of ninety specially-selected mules is announced to take place at Tattersall's to-morrow. In the technical language of the live-stock trade a "specially-selected" mule is one which has a clear reach of six feet at either end.

"The Government must say what it will do," states The Daily Mail. Waiting for The Daily Mail to say it first must not be allowed to degenerate into a mere mechanical habit.

For impersonating a voter a carpenter of Gloucester has just been sentenced to a month's imprisonment. Where he succeeded in obtaining the disguise from is not known.

WHEN TAKING A NEW HOUSE ALWAYS EMPLOY A PROFESSIONAL DRAUGHT DETECTOR.

A LOVE TRAGEDY.

He was a smart new clinical thermometer. She was a pretty nurse in an influenza ward. His figurings were clear and his quicksilver glittered. Her eyes were blue and a little curl peeped from under her cap. He fell madly in love with her; and when her dainty fingers toyed with him his little heart swelled to bursting and he registered all he could.

So when she took her morning temperatures her patients were desperately high, and when the other nurse took them in the evening they were three degrees lower; and the doctors were much perplexed.

They put the love-struck thermometer in a tumbler of warm water with two others to test him; and, freed from her influence, he recorded correctly. Learned authorities on medical research meditated pamphlets, on the new variation of the universal plague.

Then came a morning when the pretty nurse, after too many cigarettes the night before, took her own temperature. For the adoring thermometer the supreme moment had arrived. In rapturous ecstasy at the touch of her dear lips he rose to heights of exaltation that left his other efforts far behind. "Drat the thing," exclaimed the pretty nurse, putting him down nastily, "I've got it myself now," and went off to bed. He, broken-hearted, rolled off the table and died.

LONG MEMORIES.

"I remember," said a veteran of nineteen, "when there was a hansom at the stand at the corner."

"Oh, that's nothing," said a venerable spinster of twenty-one. "I've been, to dances with a female chaperon where there was no smoking on the stairs, and some people danced a thing they called a 'tango.'"

"When I was working on the land," resumed the first speaker, "I had a day off and went to lunch with people close by. The man who sat next me was a judge and asked me what an 'old bean' meant."

"Oh, cut it out!" interposed an aged matron who had not hitherto taken any part in the conversation. "When I was born there was no Daily Mail, when I went to school I was taught to play the piano with my fingers, and when I married people hadn't begun to 'jazz.'"

A NEW GAME OF BAWL.

"An open howling handicap will be held at Talleres, F.C.S., next Sunday."

Standard (Buenos Ayres).

"At a meeting of the newly-formed British and Allied Waiters', Chefs' and Employees' Union the president said that one of their main objects was to stop enemy aliens from spoiling their business. They must do this themselves."—Daily Paper.

And some of them, it must be admitted, have been making considerable efforts in this direction.

EDENTULOUS PERSONS.

It happened a long time ago. Higgins, Mackenzie and I, three irresponsible subalterns, had been lent to the Government of India for famine relief work. One Sunday we foregathered in the cool of the evening at a dak bungalow, near the point where our three districts met, to compare notes and to swap lies.

"How are you getting on?" I asked Higgins.

"I'm not getting on at all. I'm just stagnating. I do all my work and draw my pay, and there's the end of it. I'm sure the regiment has forgotten all about me, and in fact no one seems to be aware of my existence."

"Why not write to the Government of India about it?" remarked Mackenzie.

"Yes, I'm sure that's the best thing to do," I agreed. "The Collector in my district is always writing to the Government of India, and the Government prints all he writes and sends it round with remarks and decisions. He will get all sorts of honours and rewards out of this famine."

"Yes. But what shall I write?" asked Higgins. "If I simply say there is a chap called Higgins who is terribly bored and wants some notice taken of him, they won't print that sort of tosh."

"Not that particular kind of tosh, perhaps," agreed Mackenzie. "You've got to write about your work and ask for a decision on some point or other. Then they'll remember your existence; and if you write often enough you will gradually crawl out of obscurity into the limelight. Almost anything will do to start with."

"Well, I found an old woman to-day in one of my camps who could not eat her ration, because she had no teeth. Can you make anything out of that?" asked Higgins.

"We'll have a shot at it anyway," replied Mackenzie. He pulled a sheet of note-paper and a pencil out of his pocket and wrote the following