PUNCH,
OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI.

Vol. 150.

March 8th, 1916.

CHARIVARIA.

Germany is declared to have built a submarine that can go to the United States and back. Future insults therefore will be delivered by hand.

Municipal fishshops are to be established in Germany. They will be closely associated, it is understood, with the Overseas News Agency, and will make a speciality of supplying a fish diet to sailors who are unfortunately prevented by circumstances from visiting the high seas.

In his lecture before the Royal Institute last week Dr. E. G. Russell told his audience that there are 80,000,000 micro-organisms in a tablespoonful of rich cucumber soil. If we substitute German casualties for micro-organisms and deduct the average monthly wastage as shown by the private lists from the admitted official total of available effectives—but we are treading on Mr. Belloc's preserves.

The Government has announced itself as "satisfied with the measures taken to prevent Canadian nickel from reaching the Germans." Except, of course, in oblong pellets of insignificant size.

Answering a question of Sir Arthur Markham in the House of Commons last week, Mr. Tennant said, "If there was a large force of troops in Egypt, as to which it is undesirable that I should make any statement, it is quite conceivable that the presence of a hundred and seventeen Generals might be necessary." After all, if every one of them were just a Brigadier-General, they wouldn't require more than half-a-million men to keep them occupied.

Naval inspectors of cookery, it is officially announced, will hereafter wear a narrow stripe of white cloth on their cuff. This is a simplified form of the ancient heraldic emblem of the cook's guild, which was a hair frizzé naiant in a dish of soup maigre.

All kinds of cleaning and washing are to be dearer, and a patriotic movement is already on foot among the younger set to do away with these luxuries altogether in the interests of patriotic economy.

As a reward of its efforts to save the lives of war-horses, the R.S.P.C.A. has now been officially recognized by the A.V.C. Some hindrance to their work is however feared as the result of strong protests lodged by the Westphalen Pie-makers' Association of Rotterdam, which the Government, in its anxiety not to deal harshly with the neutrals, is said to be carefully considering.

The owners of certain proprietary whiskeys have decided to put them up sixpence a bottle. In response to this move the owners of certain proprietary sixpences have decided not to put them down.

A correspondent of The Times states that large numbers of Owls have taken to visiting the trenches in Flanders. The War Office, strangely enough, professes to know nothing of the circumstance.

THE ROYAL GONDOLIERS.

"We understand that our courteous Allies in Venice have offered to supply floating facilities for our troops in the flooded trenches of Flanders."

For Conscientious Objectors.

"Varicose Veins.—We stock all sizes, in best quality only."—Advt. in Irish Paper.

British Frightfulness.

"A young woman was fried as a spy in London the other day."—Sunday Pictorial.

A Leap-Year Reminder.

"February 29, 1916.—Last day for single men."—Liverpool Daily Post.

"We ... are no haters of peace. We want it more than anything in the world—except the triumph of evil."—Star.

"A fallen star," we fear.

"Mr. Lloyd George said that Cabinet Ministers had agreed to take one-fourth of their salaries in Exchequer bombs."— Provincial Paper.

The times call for strong measures, but we think this is going a little too far.

TEUTON OVERTURES.

As seen through Teuton Eyes.

These English—who can know their ways?
When, flushed with triumphs large and many,
We condescend with tactful signs
To hint of peace on generous lines
They answer in a flippant phrase
That they're "not taking any."

When from our conquering High-Seas Ark
(Detained at home by stress of weather)
We loosed the emblematic dove,
Conveying overtures of love,
Back came the bird with that remark,
Minus its best tail feather.

They said they never wanted war;
Yet, when we talk of war's abating,
And name the price for them to pay,
They have the curious nerve to say
That, when they please, and not before,
They'll do their own dictating.

How can you deal with minds so slow,
With men who give no indication
That we by any further shock
Into their heads can hope to knock
Enough intelligence to know
That they're a beaten nation?

Odd that we cannot make it clear
That we have won; and even odder
That other markets seem to jump,
While our exchange is on the slump,
And everything's starvation-dear
(Excepting cannon-fodder).

O. S.

RECONSTRUCTION.

In that dim happy past, the Summer of 1913, I first saw him idly seated in a deck-chair on the firm sands of——, on the East Coast. A quiet detached figure amid a crowd of joyous children. Hard by a boy and girl were building a moated fortress, but, alas! the swiftly incoming tide eroded its foundations until the frowning battlements tottered to destruction.

Turning, the children faced him. He smiled.

"D'you know this one, Jacky?" he ventured.

"He's Dick," the little maid protested, "and I'm Betty."

"Now we're introduced, do you know this one?" he asked again.

Straightaway he plunged into the new game, moving back to where a smooth stretch of sand lay invitingly. Immediately two minute shapes were etched with his stick on its surface.

"What's those?"

"Hairpins, of course! You always start with hairpins. And this," indicating a narrow oblong, "why, this must be that silver tray someone's always leaving her hairpins lying about on.