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blinking it―that Germany will need exactly 217,000 tons of copper per annum for ammunition alone. Of her sources of supply it may be said with absolute certitude

(1) That her present imports from neutral countries are unknown.

(2) That her own production cannot be quite exactly estimated.

(3) That no one has the least idea what her stocks were before the war.

Much depends upon what she can gather up in the way of copper wire and odds and ends. And here it must be borne in mind that any tampering with the telegraph wires may interfere with the Imperial correspondence, without which war cannot be waged. But there are other sources. And here we come to the most striking instance of lack of preparation―the one important detail where German foresight failed. It is a point that no other commentator seems to have touched upon, although it is in truth the root of the whole matter. Germany alone of all the leading belligerents is without a copper currency. She cannot turn her pennies into shot and shell. We shall not be far wrong in assuming that this deficiency will be the final turning-point. The General Staff may if it will collect all manner of cooking utensils; the time may come, under the pressure of British sea power, when they will not be of much use, any way, with nothing to cook in them. They may commandeer electric-light fittings; they cannot thereby keep the people any more in the dark than they are already. But they will be baulked and thwarted if they look to retrieve their fortunes by an assault on the National Reservoir of the pfennig-in-the-slot machine.

I am, Sir,
Yours, as before, Statistician.

"Of course," writes a correspondent, "everyone has his own bêtes noires, as you said in last week's number, and one man's black beast may be another man's white angel. This matter can be settled only by personal opinion, and yet I have a feeling that there is a set of persons whom all must equally place on the noiriest list; I mean the people who talk clever to their dogs in public." We agree.

Extract from the latest War Office Drill Book as given recently by a N.C.O.:―

"Should a Mule break down in the shafts it should be replaced by an intelligent Non-Commissioned Officer."

Gerald Arbuthnot took his seat in the train with a frown of impatience. He had, of course, other things as well, such as a return-ticket, the usual quantity of luggage, and a copy of a journal that modesty forbids us further to specify―but the frown was the significant item. How irritating it was, he thought, to be obliged to make this journey! Still more vexing were the provisions of the preposterous will that had rendered it necessary.

Gerald was a bachelor, tall, wealthy, handsome and of the usual age. It is hardly worth while for me to describe him, since you have met so often before, and will meet as often again, in the pages of contemporaries. Still, there he was―for the artist to do his worst with. To his impatience the train seemed a long while in starting. At last, however, all was ready, doors banged, whistles blew, the platform began slowly to recede past the windows...

Gerald, a little surprised, but undoubtedly relieved, settled himself comfortably in his corner. He was to enjoy the journey undisturbed. And then, just when it seemed too late, the thing happened which Gerald and you and every reader with experience had been looking out for. The door was flung open and the figure of a young girl, exquisitely, if indefinitely, clad, was thrust into the compartment.

It was the heroine.

"Here we are again," said poor Gerald wearily, but not aloud; for if he was one thing more than another it was well-mannered. "Up or down?" he asked, after a sufficient interval to allow the girl to settle herself into the opposite seat.

"I beg your pardon?" You know the voice in which she would answer, sweet yet cold―like ice-cream.

"I mean," explained Gerald, "that as some sort of dialogue is obviously expected of us we might as well begin about the window as about anything else."

She melted ever so little at this. "Possibly," she said; "but why not wait till the accident?"

"I'm afraid I don't quite understand. What accident?"

The bewilderment in Gerald's face was too apparent not to be genuine. At sight of it the last trace of chill in the girl's manner vanished utterly; as a short-story heroine she was naturally trained for speed in these matters. "Why," she said, with a little gasp of incredulity, "surely you know that I am here for you to rescue me in the railway accident?"

"It's―it's the first I've heard of it," stammered Gerald.

"But you must," persisted the girl, beginning now to be a little confused in her turn. "See, round my neck I have here the locket which falls open as you lay me unconscious upon the embankment." She unfastened it eagerly as she spoke, displaying the portrait of a young man like a cheap wax-work. "My brother" she said. "But of course you think I'm engaged to him, and you go away, and we don't meet again till long paragraphs, perhaps even pages, have rolled by."

There was a moment's rather embarrassed pause. Then she added shyly, "It―it all comes right in the end, though."

Gerald's colour matched her own. In black-and-white illustration you would have to take this for granted. But no illustrator could have made him look more foolish than was now the case.