adventure of their own and to get stuck there far beyond the possibility of help. And then what happens? The moment arrives when the new and immense Russian armies are trained, and when they have rifles and cannons and ammunition in plenty, and one fine day they wake up and hurl themselves against the Austrians, and helter-skelter away go the whole set of Archdukes and Generals and Colonels and men, each trying to see who has the longest legs and can use them quickest for escaping. And I'm expected to bring up my fellows, who have quite enough to do where they are, and to sacrifice them in helping this rabble. "Hindenburg," said the All-highest to me, "be up and doing. Show yourself worthy of your ancient glory and earn more golden nails for your wooden statue." "Majesty," I replied, "if you will leave me my fighting men, you can keep all the golden nails that were ever made." But at this he frowned, suspecting a joke: I have often noticed that he does not like jokes.

The Admiral. Yes, I have noticed that myself, and I always do my best to take him quite seriously. But I was going to tell you a little story about our speechmaking hero. Here it is. As you know, he ordered us out to fight the naval battle off Jutland.

The Marshal. Yes, I know—the great victory.

The Admiral. Hum-hum.

The Marshal. Well, wasn't it?

The Admiral. Ye-e-s, that is to say, not exactly what one understands by great and not precisely what is meant by victory. However, we can discuss that another time. What I wanted to tell you was this. The speech our friend and Kaiser made——

The Marshal. It was a highly coloured piece of fireworks.

The Admiral. Well, it was all prepared and written down days before the fight was fought. I heard this from a sure source, from someone, in fact, who had seen the manuscript and had afterwards caught sight of the Imperial one rehearsing it before a looking-glass. Whatever might have happened, the speech would have been the same, even if we had returned into harbour with only one ship—and there was a time when I thought we should hardly be able to do even that.

The Marshal. I wonder what would have happened to him if he had not been able to deliver the speech at all.

The Admiral. He would have burst himself.

The Marshal. Yes, that is what would have happened to him.

The Admiral. Well, anyhow, the beer is good here.

The Marshal. Oh, yes, the beer is all right.

THE ONLY WAY.

Judkins was the last man in the world one would have expected to meet in the fashionable costume of the day. To begin with, he was well over age. And then he was on the quiet side, usually looking for some odd, old thought which had gone astray, and possessed of one of those travelling mentalities which take note of all sides of a subject. Yet there he stood in khaki.

"The very last man in the world I expected to see like this," I said. It was quite true. Judkins was the sort who would have attempted dreamy analyses with the drill-instructor.

"Don't blame me, old thing," he said with a shade of melancholy. "I know I am stiff and over age and all that, but the recruiting fellow said he would willingly overlook a decade. There was nothing else for it. It was the only way."

"How do you mean, 'the only way'?" I asked.

Judkins sighed.

"It was like this," he explained sadly. "I should have joined up before, but I have always tried to keep to the truth ever since I was seven and told a lie, and felt that I was lost. But I gave in at last. If Lord Derby looks at my papers he will think I am forty. So I am, and a bit more. I meant to deceive his lordship, though it went against the grain. I am sure I don't know what Mr. Walter Long will say if he ever finds out what I have done. I can picture him exclaiming, 'Here's this man, Private Judkins, declaring he is only forty, when to my certain knowledge he was born in '66.'

"I am risking all that because life became insupportable. There was hardly anybody left I cared about. The one waiter at my favourite restaurant who didn't breathe down one's neck when he was holding the vegetables—he had joined; and the person who understood cigars at the corner shop, he is in it too. The new man doesn't know the difference between a Murias and a Manilla. It was the same all round. There was nobody to cut my hair. My barber was forming fours. It is a wonder to me why the War people have had to hunt the slippers, the chaps who have held back, for there is very little to tempt one to keep out of the crowd now. I've joined so as to be with the fellows I know. Don't go and put it all down to patriotism; it was just sheer loneliness. The man who sold me my evening paper—you remember him? he had a squint and used to invest in Spanish lotteries and get me to translate the letters he received—he is a soldier now; and so is the bootblack who asked for tips for the races, and the door-keeper at the offices. They're all wearing khaki, all in; and it wasn't the same world without them, only a dreary make-believe, and so I decided to deceive the War Office and join my friends. Every day I am finding the folk I'd lost. The Corporal with whom I do most business was checktaker at a theatre I used to frequent—always told me whether the show was worth the money before I parted. And the life is suiting me fairly well. Last week's route-march in the rain was a far, far wetter thing than I had ever done, but——"

He turned and gravely saluted an officer who was coming up on the wind....

THE TABLES TURNED.

NEWS FOR THE ENEMY.

Mrs. Brown. "Have you heard as how our Jim has got his stripe?"

Mr. Smith. "Hush, woman! Don't you see that notice?"

THE WATCH DOGS.

XLII.

My dear Charles,—No "Tourists' Guide to Northern France" would be complete without some mention of the picturesque town of A., a point at which even the most progressive traveller is likely to say that he's had a very pleasant journey so far, but now thinks of turning back. It boasts a small but exceedingly well-ventilated cathedral, many an eligible residence to let, and the relics of what was once a busy factory, on the few remaining bricks of which you are particularly requested to "afficher" no "affiches." It is approached by a railway, prettily overgrown with tall grasses and wild-flowers, and never made hideous these days by the presence of hustling, smoky trains. Entering daintily from the back, the tourist will soon find himself in its main street, devoid of ladies out shopping, but not without its curious collection of exuberant drain-pipes and recumbent lamp-posts. It lies, pleasantly dishevelled, in the sun, having the appearance of the bed of a restless sleeper who has shifted about somewhat in the night and made many abortive efforts to get up in the morning. Its streets are decorated with a series of dew ponds, dotted about with no apparent regard to the convenience of the traffic, and you may while away many an idle hour trying to