made the nations quiver
Proclaimed himself the finder of a river.
Maps, he declared, were made by doddering fools
Who knew no better or defied the rules,
While he, the great Progressive, traced the course
Of waters mostly flowing to their source.
Emerged at last and buoyed up with the sure hope
Of geographic fame, he made for Europe;
Flew to Madrid, and there awhile he tarried
Till Kermit went (good luck to K!) and married.
Next London sees him, and with loud good will
Yields to the mighty tamer of Brazil,
And hears and cheers the while by his own fiat he
Lectures our Geographical Society.
Soon to his native land behold him go
To take a hand in quelling Mexico.
Does Wilson want him? Well, I hardly know.

IN THE NAME OF PEACE.

Sir,—I read with intense satisfaction that at the Peace Ball at the Albert Hall last week the lady representing Britannia carried a palm branch in place of the customary trident. This, I venture to think, is a step in the right direction. For many years, from the pulpits and platforms not only of our own land but of America, I have advocated a substitution of peaceful objects for the weapons of bloodshed with which so many of our allegorical figures are encumbered. I still wait for some artist to depict the patron saint of this fair land of ours, not attacking the dragon with a cruel sword, but offering it in all brotherliness an orange, let us say, or a bath bun.

But, Sir, one feature of this ball (putting aside for a moment the many reprehensible characteristics of all such entertainments) I must and do protest against. What do I read in the daily press? When it was desired to clear the floor, "a brigade of Guards, by subtle movements, drove the masqueraders, who were to form the audience, behind the barricades." Now, were I a member of the House of Commons—as some day I may be—I would make it my business to stand up in my place and fearlessly demand of the Minister for War an explanation as to how these men of blood came to be admitted to a Peace festival. Was it with his knowledge that they were present? and, if so, was it with his consent? I should also desire to know whether the cost of the expedition would fall upon the British tax-payer.

I am, Sir, Yours, etc., (Rev.) Amos Blick.

AMENDING A BILL.

As the drought wore on to its third day I began to perceive that siphoning the pinks with soda-water out of the dining-room window was insufficient to meet the crisis. I rang up the nearest fire station and told them in my most staccato tones that the garden was being burnt to a cinder and would they please—but they rang off suddenly without making a reply. It was then that I had a bright idea—so bright that the thermometer which was hanging near my head went up two degrees higher still.

"Araminta," I cried (she was out on the lawn tantalising a rose-bush with a kind of doll's-house watering-can),—"Araminta, where does one go to get hose?"

Araminta bridled.

"I didn't mean that," I said, hastily coming out of the French-window to explain. "I meant the kind of long wiggly thing you fix on to a tap at one end and it squirts at the other."

She unbridled prettily. "Oh, that!" she said. "Altruage's have them, I suppose. Altruage's have everything. But I shouldn't get one if I were you. I believe they're fearfully expensive, and I'm going to buy a proper watering-can this morning."

My mind, however, was made up. "Expense," I thought, "be irrigated!" I said nothing about it to Araminta, but I decided to act.

The sun was still blazing with abominable ferocity at half-past twelve when I crossed the threshold of the Taj Mahal Stores and button-holed the first