Page:Punch Vol 148.djvu/535

There is gnashing of teeth in Germany. The Allan liner Corsican, with 700 women and 300 children on board, has arrived safely at Glasgow from Canada. Someone, it is said, will have to pay the penalty for allowing a cargo such as this to escape.

"ROMAN REMAINS IN THE CITY," states a head-line in a contemporary. The explanation probably is that he is too old to return to Italy and take his place in the firing line.

The Vossische Zeitung has published an article suggesting that Austria should make friends with Serbia by offering her a present of a slab of Austrian territory. This would certainly be a most strange ending to Austria's punitive expedition, and we suspect that Serbia is wondering where the catch is.

A lesson to the pessimists here who make mountains out of molehills. The soldiers at the Front have now, The Morning Post tells us, made a plain of Hill 60.

The fact that the visit of the Zeppelins to London was followed by a boom in recruiting in the Metropolis, is of course being pointed to by the Germans as a sign that Londoners now realise that it is not safe to remain in their city.

The Home Secretary, we understand, cannot see his way to allow a distinguished Anglo-German who dwells in our midst with his family to exhibit, with a view to safeguarding his home against Zeppelins, an illuminated sky-sign bearing the words "Gute leute wohnen hier" ("Good people live here").

The Berliner Tageblatt states that Herr Philipp Saszko, a Hungarian artist resident in London, has been removed from the list of members of a Hungarian artistic society for having adopted British nationality. This is another lie. The compliment in question has been paid to Mr. Philip Laszlo.

"It does not matter to me," said a Birmingham Socialist and gas-worker, "whether I am under Germans, Russians, or Kaiser William, or anyone else." That being so he cannot grumble at having been sentenced to be under Lock and Key for three months.

It seems almost a pity that the French should have found it necessary to take the sugar refinery at Souchez last week. Frankly we think it regrettable that the modern Huns should be deprived of any refining influence.

The Telegraaf, of Amsterdam, reports that the German military authorities in Belgium have decided to entrust the watching of the frontier to police dogs, each sentry having two of these animals at his disposal; and our Government is now being blamed for keeping our dogs in ignorance of the War which is raging, and so preventing them volunteering for the Front and making short work of the German hounds.

By the way, the Germans are said to have induced their dogs to go to the Front by a characteristic trick. The animals were told that, if they did not go, they would be stored as emergency rations.

The Inland Revenue authorities anticipate that the valuation of the whole of the United Kingdom as provided for under the Finance Act of 1910 will be completed by the end of this month. It is possible, however, that the result will be kept secret for fear of whetting Germany's appetite.

The Home Office has issued a denial of the statement that it has ordered that in all cases of deaths occurring in baths an expert pathologist should be called in. We hear that many nervous married ladies never enter their baths now without an inflatable blouse and a life-buoy.

A Brussels printer has been fined forty pounds by the Germans for having printed a prayer in which the phrase occurred, "Deliver us from our enemies." This is curious, as we understood that the Germans were now the friends of the Belgians.

Modesty is an engaging quality in a young man, and the War Office is said to have appreciated the letter of a youth with no military experience whatever who, in applying for a commission, stated that he would be quite willing to start as a lieutenant.

Cubist Artist (who is being arrested for espionage by local constable). "My dear man, have you no æsthetic sense? Can't you see that this picture is an emotional impression of the inherent gladness of Spring?"

Constable. "Stow it, Clarence! D'yer think I don't know a bloomin' plan when I sees one?"

Extract from moneylender's circular:—

"Should business result from this letter, either now or in the future, I take this opportunity of assuring you that you will find my methods honourable to the smallest degree."

An extract from one of Mr. Belloc's articles:

"It may fairly be said that the Trentino is for the Austrians a defensive asset of the first quality, and that if Italy can force it she will have achieved a task which military opinion throughout Europe regards as one of the utmost difficulty, and will correspondingly raise her prestige.... hm hm hm mmm."

Manchester Evening Chronicle.

For our part we consider the statement to be almost a truism, and cannot understand why the Manchester compositor should be so sceptical about it.

"The merry month of May has played hor daintiest pranks, and the page of the calendar that ends on Monday will be indexed among those which are to be found among the superlative adjectives in the list of the weatherwise. Nature has contrived to crowd its most wonderful whims into the thirty-two days of the fickle month."—Smethwick Telephone.

Even at Smethwick, you see, The Telephone cannot avoid its besetting sin—"Wrong number!"