Page:Punch Vol 148.djvu/153

singularly high-strung, not to say jerky, race, the women especially betraying their emotions with a primitive absence of self-control. There, the pleasure of the chase has become a delirious orgy, though much valuable time is lost both by pursuers and pursued, owing to an inveterate habit of stopping and leaping high at intervals. Squinting is a not uncommon affliction, as is also abnormal stoutness, the latter, however, being always combined with a surprising agility. In personal encounters, which are by no means uncommon, it is considered not only legitimate but laudable to kick the adversary whenever he turns his back, and also to spring at him, encircle his waist with your legs, and bite his car. The local police are all either overgrown or undersized, and have been carefully trained to fall over one another at about every five yards. As guardians of the peace, however, I prefer our own force.

I could not have written even so brief an account as this unless I had paid many visits to Cinemaland. If I am spared I fully expect to pay many more. The truth is that I cannot keep away from the country. Why, I can't explain, but I fancy it is because it is so absolutely unlike any other country with which I happen to be familiar.

The one seated (reading newspaper of January 29th). "'20,000 GERMANS FALLEN IN ATTEMPT AT COUP-DE-MAIN.' Can yer see it? C-O-U-P., D-E., M-A-I-N. Stick a Union Jack in there."

{{blockquote| "The practice of compulsorily enrolling men for defence against invasion can be traced from before the time of Alfred the Great, when every man between 18 and 60 had to serve right up to the time of the Napoleonic wars."—Saturday Review.

It was found, however, that men who had enlisted in Alfred the Great's time at the age of sixty were of little real use in the Napoleonic wars.

[A number of curious facts about the British Army, lately gathered from German sources, may be supplemented by some further information of interest bearing on our Fleet.]

The facts may be obscured for purposes of recruiting, but it remains true that British seamen are no better than serfs. Their officers have the most complete proprietorship in their persons and can do with them what they like, as in the case of the English captain who had a favourite shark, which followed his ship, and to which he throw an A.B. each morning. That their slavery is acknowledged by the men is shown by their custom of referring to the Captain as "The Owner."

The savagery of the British Navy has passed into a by-word, and the bluejackets popularly go by the name of Jack Tartars.

It is all very well for America to protest her neutrality to Berlin, but how can we ignore the fact that President Wilson actually has a seat on the board of the British Admiralty where he is known as "Tug" Wilson. He is even the author of a work aimed deliberately at us, and entitled Der Tug.

The superstitions of ignorant British seamen, notably the Horse Marines, whose credulity has no parallel, is extraordinary. Mascots are carried on all ships. For instance, no ship's carpenter will ever go to sea without a walrus.