Page:Punch Vol 148.djvu/415

The cost of the War up to date is estimated at £5,867,000,000. This seems a great deal, and we cannot help thinking that there must have been extravagance somewhere.

"For every maltreated German submarine seaman," says Die Post, "Germany must seize an imprisoned British officer and subject him to a tenfold more cruel torture. No middle course is possible. We have the example of the Middle Ages before us, let us follow it." This frank confession on the part of Germany that she is a bit behind the Middle Ages is illuminating.

According to the Kreuzzeitung, St. Paul's Cathedral is filled with machine guns and other military material. It is always interesting to account for an exaggeration, and the origin of this one is no doubt the fact that a few minor canons have been seen in the sacred edifice.

"KILL THAT FLY!
Necessity for a rigorous campaign."

Globe.

At last the British public is waking up to the Zeppelin danger.

It is denied, by the way, that the three bombs which were found in the grounds of Henham Hall were deliberately aimed at that mansion on account of its having been converted into a hospital; they just fell there instinctively.

"Yesterday the English made use of grenades and bombs in the vicinity east of Ypres which omit suffocating and noxious gases." This message, The Globe tells us, was sent out by German wireless, and it is satisfactory to note that the enemy admit our methods to be more humane than their own.

An inhabitant of Cologne has been fined £3 for giving war bread to his dog. The proceedings were instituted, we understand, at the instance of the local Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals.

"Has a place-name any right to a mark of exclamation?" asks Observator, in The Observer, and instances the case of Westward Ho! It is certainly curious that the much more violent expression "Amsterdam" should have none, and that some of the most difficult names in the War area have no such comment permanently attached to them.

The Strand Theatre's new play is, we see, written by Harriet Ford and Harvey J. O. Higgins, "in co-operation with Detective William J. Burns." Was the Detective, we wonder, called in to unravel the plot?

Quite a little panic, we hear, was caused among elderly Music Hall artistes the other day by the announcement that a lecture was to be delivered at the Royal Institution on "Stars and their Age."

Grave-diggers in several parts of the country are agitating for a rise in wages on account of the increased cost of living. The difficulty, of course, is that, if a rise be granted, it may lead to an increase in the cost of dying.

The Government remedy for the drink evil is to be, we are told, "Low alcohol." And we believe that even that will be lowered.

Mother. "Well, Master Jim hasn't gone to the front after all."

Cook. "Oh, poor Master Jim! And 'e's so fond of a day's shootin'."

"The Governors have a Temporary Vacancy for a Teacher (either Male or Female) of Temporary Mathematics, Physics and Chemistry."—Spectator.

Let us hope that they also have a Permanent Vacancy for a Teacher of Permanent German.

"PARIS, Wednesday.—The following official communiqué was issued to-night:—

A Zeppelin threw bombs near Bailleul at our communiqué of last evening."

Western Evening Herald.

Another German attempt to suppress the truth!