Page:Punch Vol 148.djvu/355

Jack Tar on leave. "Yes, it was a desprit affair, and ammunition was running short. Why, at the finish we was firing six-inch shells out of our four-point-sevens!"

A correspondent, writing to The Observer, states that he hears every morning a blackbird singing the four opening notes of the refrain of "Rule, Britannia," and wonders "whether the bird has picked it up during the present war." Surely there can be no doubt of this. The writer will, however, be interested to hear that his experience is by no means unique, as is evidenced by the following letters:—

A well-known Headmaster writes as follows:—"Your readers will be glad to learn that the cuckoo has already been heard here (Berkshire), though the date is unusually early. I was seated recently in my garden, enjoying the leading article in The Daily Herald, when I distinctly caught the familiar notes. But conceive my interest and pleasure when, as I listened for a repetition, there reached me instead the first bars of that magnificent air, Deutschland Über Alles, with which the bird had evidently been at considerable pains to familiarise itself. What a needed lesson is here for us all!

P.S.—It is the cuckoo that fouls its own nest, isn't it? or am I wrong?"

Mr. Arnold White says:—"It is a singular fact that regularly every Friday morning, as I sit in my study writing my famous anti-Kaiser causerie for a certain Sunday journal, I am saluted by a remarkably fine blackbird, which from an adjacent bush continues to repeat the refrain, 'Down, Willie! Down, Willie!' without pause or variation. So far as I know the intelligent bird is entirely self-taught."

Dear Sir,—Perhaps you will allow me to add my own experience to those of your other Correspondents. A nest of thrushes having recently been established outside my bathroom window, I have had frequent opportunities for studying the behaviour of the occupants. I was specially interested to note that on the morning after the fall of Przemysl the parent bird, varying its usual attitude and monotonous call, perched on the edge of the nest and whistled the whole of the Russian National Anthem with quite remarkable finish. I was even more struck by the conduct of the young birds, who, though still unsteady upon their legs, rose simultaneously at the opening bar and remained standing throughout the entire performance. Such patriotism on the part of our unfledged songsters is, I think, a truly encouraging sign.

I am, Sir,
Yours, etc.,
A Kipling Lucas.

"BIRTHS.
FOUR YEARS' REFUND OF INCOME TAX.

Brett—March 27, at Montrose, Fortwilliam Park, the wife of the Rev. H. R. Brett, of a son.

Fisher—March 27, at Dunowen, Cliftonville, Belfast, to Mr. and Mrs. Alfred Fisher, a son."—Newry Telegraph.

If the {{sc|Chancellor of the Exchequer{{ will confirm the above announcement Mr. Punch will feel inclined to revise his notorious advice to those about to marry.

The following notice appeared in "Station Orders" issued by the Brigadier-General at Meerut:—

"Found:—On the road to Begamabad, one .303 Blank Cartridge. Apply to the Station Staff Officer, Meerut."

It is comforting to find one person who is determined that the Army shall not go short of ammunition, even if it be only blank.