Lord Milner has gone so far in the House of Lords as to say that "such war news as is published has from first to last been seriously misleading." The Balkan intelligence that is allowed to reach us does not exactly deserve this censure. To call it misleading would be too high praise; it seldom rises beyond a level of blameless irrelevance. It is hardly a burlesque of the facts to say that a cable from Amsterdam informs us that the Copenhagen correspondent of the Echo de Paris learns from Salonika, via Lemnos and Nijni Novgorod, that in high official circles in Bukarest it is rumoured that in Constantinople the situation is considered grave; and then we are warned that too much credence must not be given to this report. The number of Censors at the Press Bureau being exactly forty, and their minute knowledge of English literature having been displayed on several occasions, it is said that Sir John Simon contemplates their incorporation as an Academy of "Immortals—for the duration of the War."



Mr. Punch's Correspondent "Blanche" sends distressing details of some of the new complaints contracted by smart war workers. These include munition-wrists, shell-makers' crouch, neuro-committee-itis, and Zeppelin-eye through looking up into the sky too long with a telescope.

A great deal depends on what you look at and what you look through. Thus Mr. Walter Long says that when he reads carping criticisms upon the conduct of the War he looks through his window at the people in the street and is always surprised to see the quiet steadfast manner in which they are going about their business. It is a good plan, but not always successful. The Kaiser got his view of the Irish people through a Casement, and it was entirely erroneous.

The Cologne Gazette has stated that "there is in England no real soldiers' humour such as we have." Certainly we have nothing like it, though we confess to preferring the home-grown brand.



December, 1915

Kut and Ctesiphon, Ctesiphon and Kut. Thus may the events of the last month in Mesopotamia, no longer a "blessed word," be expressed in a bald formula, which takes no account of the unavailing heroism of General Townshend's small but splendid force. Things have not been going well in the East. The Allies have been unable to save Serbia, Monastir has fallen, and our lines have been withdrawn to Salonika. The experts are now divided into two camps, the Westerners and the Easterners, and the former, pointing to the evacuation of Gallipoli, are loud in their denunciations of costly "side-shows," and the folly of strengthening Germany's hold on Turkey by killing out the Turks, instead of concentrating all our forces on killing the Germans on the Western front. The time is not yet come to decide which is right. But all are agreed with the British officer who described the Australian soldier at Gallipoli as "the bravest thing God ever made," and so prompted these lines:

Bravest, where half a world of men Are brave beyond all earth's rewards, So stoutly none shall charge again Till the last breaking of the swords; Wounded or hale, won home from war, Or yonder by the Lone Pine laid; Give him his due for evermore— "The bravest thing God ever made!"

Though the wings of the angel of Peace cannot be heard, peace kite-flying has already begun in Vienna, but Germany is anxious to represent it as unauthorised and improper. Mr. Henry Ford's voyage to Europe on the Oscar II with a strangely assorted group of Pacificists does more credit to his heart than his head, and the conflicting elements in his party have earned for his ship the name of "The Tug of Peace." Anyhow, England is taking no risks on the strength of these irregular "overtures." A vote has been passed for a further increase of our "contemptible little Army" to four millions; and the manufacture of high explosive goes on in an ever-increasing ratio. Sir Douglas Haig has succeeded Sir John French as Commander-in-Chief of our Armies in France; Sir William Robertson is the new Chief of Staff—Scotsmen both of the finest type—and the appointments are universally approved, even by the Daily Mail. The temper of the men in France is well hit off by an officer when he says that "Atkins is really best when an ordinary mortal might be contemplating suicide or desertion." And officers arriving on leave at Victoria at 2 A.M. are driven to the conclusion that they are sent back to England from time to time to check their optimism, which at the front survives even being sent to so-called rest camps in the middle of a malodorous marsh for nine hours' military training per diem. The "philosophy of Thomas" is inscrutable, but no doubt he derives satisfaction from comparisons:

If we're standin' in two foot o' water, you see Quite likely the Boches are standin' in three; An' though the keen frost may be ticklin' our toes, 'Oo doubts that the Boches' 'ole bodies is froze?

So 'ere's our philosophy, simple an' plain: Wotever we 'ates in the bloomin' campaign, 'Tis balm to our souls, as we grumble an' cuss, To feel that the Boches are 'atin' it wuss.

Hardest of all is the lot of the trooper in the trenches, who "thinks all day and dreams all night of a slap-bang, tally-ho! open fight," but for the time being "like a blinded mole toils in a furrow and lives in a hole."



The National Thrift campaign is carried on with great earnestness in Parliament. Luxury, waste, unnecessary banquets, high legal salaries have all come under the lash of the economy hunters. Of the maxim that "Charity begins, at home," they have, however, so far shown no appreciation beyond abstaining from voting any addition to their salary of L400 a year. Mr. Asquith's announcement that he takes his salary, and is going to continue taking it, has naturally lifted a great weight from the minds of these vicarious champions of economy.



Evidence of the chastened condition of the enemy is to be found in the statement on the official notepaper of Wolff's Telegraphic Bureau "that it assumes no responsibility of any kind for the accuracy of the news which it circulates." But there is no confirmation of the report that its dispatches will in future be known as "Lamb's Tales." The German Imperial Chancellor has replied to an appeal from a deputation of German Roman Catholics on behalf of the Armenians that "The German Government, in friendly communication with the Turkish Government, has been at constant pains to better the situation of Turkey's Christian subjects." Thanks to this friendly intervention, more than half a million Armenians will never suffer again from Turkish misrule.

Mr. Roosevelt has added to the picturesqueness of political invective by describing Mr. Wilson's last Presidential message as "worthy of a Byzantine logothete." It is not often that one finds a rough-rider and ex-cowboy who is able to tackle a don in his own lingo. But Tommy at the front manages to converse with the poilu without any vocabulary at all:

I met a chap the other day a-roostin' in a trench, 'E didn't know a word of ours nor me a word of French, An' 'ow it was we managed—well, I cannot understand, But I never used the phrase-book, though I 'ad it in my hand.

I winked at 'im to start with; 'e grinned from ear to ear; An' 'e says "Tipperary," an' I says "Sooveneer"; 'E 'ad my only Woodbine, I 'ad 'is thin cigar, Which set the ball a-rollin', an' so—well, there you are!

I showed 'im next my wife an' kids, 'e up an' showed me 'is, Them funny little Frenchy kids with 'air all in a frizz; "Annette," 'e says, "Louise," 'e says, an' 'is tears began to fall; We was comrades when we parted, but we'd 'ardly spoke at all.



January, 1916.

The New Year brings us a mixed bag of tricks, good and bad. Our armies grow in numbers and efficiency, in men and munitions. The new Commander-in-Chief on the Western front, and his new Chief of Staff, inspire confidence in all ranks, combatant and non-combatant. John Ward, the Labour Member, hitherto a strong opponent of conscription, and now a full-blown Colonel, has hurried over from the front to defend the Compulsory Service Bill in a manly and animated speech, and the Bill, despite the "Pringling" and pacificism of a small but local minority, has passed through Committee.

Against these encouraging omens we have to set the complete evacuation of Gallipoli, the scene of unparalleled heroism and unavailing sacrifice, the fall of Monastir, the overrunning of Serbia, labour troubles on the Clyde, and the ignominious exemption of Ireland from the Military Service Bill. General Townshend, rebus angustis animosus—"in a tight place but full of beans"—is besieged in Kut, and the relieving forces have not been able to dislodge the Turks. Climate and weather and terrain are all against us.

Humanitarian Pacificists are much impressed by Germany's piteous lamentations over the brutality of the blockade. In these appeals to America optimists detect signs of cracking. Cooler observers explain them as evidence of her policy of shamming dead.

English mothers who have lost their only sons cannot be expected to show sympathy for an Emperor who combines the professions of a Jekyll with the ferocity of a Hyde. Yet few of them would rewrite the record of these short lives; their pride is greater than their pain.

While the daily toll of life is heavy, War, shorn of its pomp and pageantry, drags wearily in the trenches. The Lovelace of to-day is a troglodyte, biding his time patiently, but often a prey to ennui. This is how he writes to Lucasta to correct the portrait painted by her fancy:

Above, the sky is very grey, the world is very damp. His light the sun denies by day, the moon by night her lamp; Across the landscape, soaked and sad, the dull guns answer back, And through the twilight's futile hush spasmodic rifles crack.

The papers haven't come to-day to show how England feels; The hours go lame and languidly between our Spartan meals; We've written letters till we're tired, with not a thing to tell Except that nothing's doing, weather beastly, writer well.

So when you feel for us out here—as well I know you will— Then sympathise with thousands for their country sitting still; Don't picture battle-pieces by the lurid Press adored, But miles and miles of Britishers, in burrows, badly bored.



Small wonder that Lovelace in the trenches envies the Flying Man:

He rides aloof on god-like wings, Taking no thought of wire or mud, Saps, smells, or bugs—the mundane things That sour our lives and have our blood.

The roads we trudged with feet of lead, The shadows of his pinions skim; The river where we piled our dead Is but a silver thread to him.

Lovelace in the air might tell another story; but both are at one with their prototype in the spirit which made him say: "I could not love thee, dear, so much, loved I not honour more," though neither of them would say it.

In this context one may add that the Flying Men are not alone in exciting envy. Bread is the staff of life, and in the view of certain officers in the trenches the life of the Staff is one long loaf.

The discussion on the withdrawal of Members' salaries has died down. The incident is now buried, and here is its epitaph:

Some three-score years or so ago six hundred gallant men Made a charge that cost old England dear; they lost four hundred then: To-day six hundred make a charge that costs the country dear, But now they take four hundred each—four hundred pounds a year.

Our journalists have been visiting the Fleet, and one of them, in a burst of candour tempered with caution, declares that "one would like to describe much more than one has seen, but that is impossible." Some other correspondents have found no such difficulty. But for admirable candour commend us to the Daily Mail of December 24, where we read, "The Daily Mail will not be published to-morrow, and for that reason we seize the occasion to-day of bidding our readers a Merry Christmas"—and a very good reason too. Mr. Punch is glad to reprint a ten-year-old girl's essay on "Patriotism": "Patriotism is composed of patriots, and they are people who live in Ireland and want Mr. Redmond or other people to be King of Ireland. They are very brave, some of them, and are so called after St. Patrick, who is Ireland's private saint. The patriots who are brave make splendid soldiers. The patriots who are not brave go to America." And here is a topical extract from a letter written to a loved one from the Front:

"I received your dear little note in a sandbag. You say that you hope the sandbag stops a bullet. Well, to tell the truth, I hope it don't, as I have been patching my trousers with it."



Tommy is adding to his other great qualities that of diplomacy, to judge from the incident illustrated above.



February, 1916.

The Epic of the Dardanelles is closed; that of Verdun has begun, and all eyes are focused on the tremendous struggle for the famous fortress. The Crown Prince has still his laurels to win, and it is clear that no sacrifice of German "cannon fodder" will be too great to deter him from pushing the stroke home. Fort Douaumont has fallen, and the hill of the Mort Homme has already terribly justified its cadaverous name. The War-lords of Germany are sorely in need of a spectacular success even though they purchase it at a great price, for they are very far from having everything their own way. Another Colony has gone the way of Tsing-tau, New Guinea and South-West Africa. The German Kamerun has cried "Kamerad!" General Smuts, like Botha, "Boer and Briton too," has gone off to take command in East Africa, and in the Caucasus Erzerum has fallen to the Russians. The Kaiser is reported to be bitterly disappointed with Allah.

Sir Edward Grey is not altogether satisfied with the conduct of the Neutral Powers. He has no desire to make things as irksome to them as some of his critics desire. But he has pointed out that in the matter of preventing supplies from reaching the enemy by circuitous routes Great Britain has her own work to do, and means to do it thoroughly.

The miraculous forbearance of President Wilson, in face of the activities of Count Bernstorff, is even more trying to a good many of his countrymen than it is to the belligerent Briton. Mr. Roosevelt, for instance, derives no satisfaction from being the fellow-countryman of a man who can "knock spots" off Job for patience. The New York Life has long criticised the President with a freedom far eclipsing anything in the British Press. It has now crowned its "interventionist" campaign by a "John Bull number," the most generous and graceful tribute ever paid to England by the American Press.



The Military Service Bill has passed through both Houses, and may be trusted to hasten still further the amazing growth of our once "contemptible little" Army. The pleasantest incident during the month at Westminster has been the tribute paid to the gallantry and self-sacrifice of the officers and men of our mercantile marine. The least satisfactory aspect of Parliamentary activity has been the ventilation of silly rumours at Question time, in which Mr. Ginnell has been so well to the fore as to suggest some subtle connection between cattle-driving and hunting for mares' nests.

Steps have already been taken to restrict the imports of luxuries, and Ministers are believed to be unanimous in regarding "ginger" as an article whose importation might be profitably curtailed. It has been calculated that the annual expenses saved by the closing of the London Museums and Galleries amount to about one-fifth of the public money spent on the salaries of Members of Parliament. In other words:

Let Art and Science die, But give us still our old Loquacity.

Intellectual retrenchment, of course, is desirable,

But let us still keep open one collection Of curiosities and quaint antiques, Under immediate Cabinet direction— The finest specimens of talking freaks, Who constitute our most superb museum, Judged by the salaries with which we fee 'em.

Lord Sumner, however, seems to have no illusions on this score. He is reported to have said that "if the House of Lords and the House of Commons could be taken and thrown into a volcano every day the loss represented would be less than the daily loss of the campaign." It sounds a drastic remedy, but might be worth trying.

Field-Marshal Lord French has taken over the responsibility for home defence against enemy aircraft, with Sir Percy Scott as his expert adviser. But the status of Sir Percy, who, as officially announced, "has not quite left the Admiralty and has not quite joined the War Office," seems to suggest "a kind of giddy harumfrodite—soldier an' sailor too."

The War fosters the study of natural and unnatural history.



Many early nestings are recorded as the result of mild weather, and at least one occasional visitor (Polonius bombifer) has laid eggs in various parts of the country.



March, 1916.

The month of the War god has again justified its name and its traditions. Both entry and exit have been leonine. The new submarine "frightfulness" began on the 1st, and the battle round Verdun, in which the fate of Paris, to say the least, is involved, has raged with unabated fury throughout the entire month.

Germany's junior partners, Turkey and Bulgaria, are for the moment more concerned with bleeding Germany than with shedding their blood for her; Enver Pasha is reported to have gone to pay a visit to the tomb of the Prophet at Medina; Portugal, our oldest ally, is now officially at war with Germany, and the dogs of frightfulness are already toasting "der Tagus."

On our share of the Western front there is still what is nominally described as a "lull." But, as a young Officer writes, "you must not imagine that life here is all honey. Even here we do a bit for our eight-and-sixpence." Once upon a time billets were billets. They now very often admit of being shelled with equal exactitude from due in front and due in rear, and water is laid on throughout. "It is a fact well known to all our most widely circulated photographic dailies that the German gunners waste a power of ammunition. The only criticism I have to make is that I wish they would waste it more carefully. The way they go strewing the stuff about around us is such that they're bound to hit someone or something before long. Still, we have only two more days in these trenches, and they seldom give us more than ten thousand shells a day."



Letters from second-lieutenants seldom go beyond a gentle reminder that their life is not an Elysium. They offer a strange contrast to the activities of Parliamentary grousers and scapegoat hunters. If the Germans were in occupation of the Black Country, if Oxford were being daily shelled as Rheims is, and if with a favouring breeze London could hear the dull rumble of the bombardment as Paris can, one wonders if Members would still be encumbering the Order-paper with the vexatious trivialities that now find place there, or emitting what a patriotic Labour Member picturesquely described as "the croakings and bleatings of the fatted lambs who have besmirched their country." Per contra we welcome the optimism of Mr. Asquith in discussing new Votes of Credit, though he reminds us of Micawber calculating his indebtedness for the benefit of Traddles. It will be remembered that when the famous IOU had been handed over, Copperfield remarked, "I am persuaded not only that this was quite the same to Mr. Micawber as paying the money, but that Traddles himself hardly knew the difference until he had had time to think about it." Then we have had the surprising but welcome experience of Mr. Tim Healy championing the Government against Sir John Simon's attack on the Military Service Bill; and have listened to Lord Montagu of Beaulieu's urgent plea in the Lords for unity of air control, a proposal which Lord Haldane declared could not be adopted without some "violent thinking." Most remarkable of all has been Mr. Churchill's intervention in the debate on the Naval Estimates, his gloomy review of the situation—Mr. Churchill is always a pessimist when out of office—and the marvellous magnanimity of his suggestion that Lord Fisher should be reinstated at the Admiralty, on the ground that his former antagonist was the only possible First Sea Lord. Mr. Balfour dealt so faithfully with these criticisms and suggestions that there seems to be no truth in the report that Mr. Churchill has been asked to join the Government as Minister of Admonitions. A new and coruscating star has swum into our Parliamentary ken in the shape of the Member for Mid-Herts, and astronomers have labelled it "Pegasus [Greek: pi beta]." When the House of Commons passed the Bill prohibiting duels it ought to have made an exception in favour of its own Members. Nothing would have done more to raise the tone of debate, for offenders against decorum would gradually have eliminated one another. Yet Parliament has its merits, not the least of them being the scope it still affords for hereditary talent. Lord Derby, at the moment the most prominent man on the Home Front after the Premier, is the grandson of the "Rupert of Debate," and the new Minister of Blockade enters on his duties close on fifty years after another Lord Robert Cecil entered the Cabinet of Lord Derby. So history repeats itself with a difference. In spite of the Coalition, or perhaps because of it, the old strife of Whigs and Tories has revived, though the lines of cleavage are quite different from what they were. Thus the new Tories are the men who believe that the War is going to be decided by battles in Flanders and the North Sea, and would sacrifice everything for victory, even the privilege of abusing the Government. The new Whigs are the men who consider that the House of Commons is the decisive arena, and that even the defeat of the Germans would be dearly purchased at the cost of the individual's right to say and do what he pleased.



After the exhibition of Mr. Augustus John's portrait of Mr. Lloyd George, the most startling personal event of the month has been the dismissal of Grand Admiral Tirpitz. According to one account, he resigned because he could not take the German Fleet out. According to another, it was because he could no longer take the German people in.

At Oxford the Hebdomadal Council have suspended the filling of the Professorship of Modern Greek for six months. Apparently there is no one about just now who understands the modern Greek. A French correspondent puts it somewhat differently: "La Grece Antique: Hellas. La Grece Moderne: Helas!"



April, 1916.

Who would have thought when the month opened that at its close a new front within the Four Seas would be added to our far-flung line, Dublin's finest street half ruined, Ireland placed under martial law? Certainly not Mr. Birrell or Mr. Redmond or the Irish Nationalist Members. The staunchest Unionist would acquit Mr. William O'Brien of any menace when in the Budget Debate, three weeks before the Rebellion of Easter Week, he gave it as his opinion that Ireland ought to be omitted from the Budget altogether. So, too, with Mr. Tim Healy, whose principal complaint was that the tax on railway tickets would put a premium on foreign travel; that people would go to Paris instead of Dublin, and Switzerland instead of Killarney. No, so far as the Government and Ireland's Parliamentary representatives went, it was a bolt from the blue—or the green. Mr. Birrell, Chief Secretary for Ireland for nine years, a longer period than any of his predecessors, has shown himself conspicuous at once by his absence and his innocence, and England in her hour of need, with the submarine peril daily growing and all but starved out after a heroic defence, stands to pay dearly for the privilege of entrusting the administration of Ireland to an absentee humorist.

On the Western front Verdun still rivets all eyes. The German hordes are closing in on the fortress, but at a heavier cost for each mile gained than they have ever paid before.

Germany's colossal effort would inspire admiration as well as respect if she would only fight clean. The ugly stories of her treatment of prisoners have now culminated in the terrible record of the typhus-stricken camp at Wittenberg, where the German doctors deserted their post.



The report of Mr. Justice Younger's Committee, in which the tale of this atrocity is fully told, is being circulated in neutral countries, and Mr. Will Thorne has suggested that it should also be sent to our conscientious objectors. It is well to administer some sort of corrective to the information diffused by the neutral newsmonger:

Who cheers us when we're in the blues, With reassuring German news, Of starving Berliners in queues? The Neutral.

And then, soon after, tells us they Are feeding nicely all the day, And in the old familiar way? The Neutral.

Who sees the Kaiser in Berlin, Dejected, haggard, old as sin, And shaking in his hoary skin? The Neutral.

Then says he's quite a Sunny Jim, That buoyant health and youthful vim Are sticking out all over him? The Neutral.

Who tells us tales of Krupp's new guns, Much larger than the other ones, And endless trains chock-full of Huns? The Neutral.

And then, when our last hope has fled, Declares the Huns are either dead Or hopelessly dispirited? The Neutral.

In short, who seems to be a blend Of Balaam's Ass, the bore's godsend, And Mrs. Gamp's elusive friend? The Neutral.

In Parliament we have had the biggest Budget ever known introduced in the shortest Budget speech of the last half-century, at any rate. Mr. Pemberton Billing is doing his best every Tuesday to bring the atmosphere of the aerodrome into the House. Mr. Tennant has promised his sympathetic consideration to Mr. Billing's offer personally to organise raids on the enemy's aircraft bases, and the House is bearing up as well as can be expected under the shadow of this impending bereavement. Mr. Swift MacNeill is busy with his patriotic effort to purge the roll of the Lords of the peerages now held by enemy dukes. For the rest, up to Easter Week, the Parliamentary situation has been described as "a cabal every afternoon and a crisis every second day."

It is one of the strange outcomes of this wonderful time that there is more gaiety as well as more suffering in hospitals during the War than in peace. Certainly such a request would never have been heard in normal years as that recently made by a nurse to a roomful of irrepressible Tommies at a private hospital:

"A message has just come in to ask if the hospital will make a little less noise as the lady next door has a touch of headache."

For shouting "The Zepps are coming!" a Grimsby girl has been fined L1. It was urged in defence that the girl suffered from hallucinations, one being that she was a daily newspaper proprietor. But the recent Zeppelin raids have not been without their advantages. In a spirit of emulation an ambitious hen at Acton has laid an egg weighing 5-1/4 oz.



May, 1916.

Verdun still holds out: that is the best news of the month. The French with inexorable logic continue to exact the highest price for the smallest gain of ground. If the Germans are ready to give 100,000 men for a hill or part of a hill they may have it. If they will give a million men they may perhaps have Verdun itself. But so far their Pyrrhic victories have stopped short of this limit, and Verdun, like Ypres, battered, ruined and evacuated by civilians, remains a symbol of Allied tenacity and the will to resist.

The months in war-time sometimes belie their traditions, but it is fitting that in May we should have enlisted a new Ally—the Sun. The Daylight Saving Bill became Law on May 17. Here is a true economy, and our only regret is that Mr. Willett, the chief promoter of a scheme complacently discussed during his lifetime as ingenious but impracticable, should not have lived to witness its swift and unmurmuring acceptance under stress of war.

The official communiques from the Irish Front in the earlier stages of the Dublin rebellion did not long maintain their roseate complexion. Even before the end of April a Secret Session—the second in a week—was held to discuss the Irish situation. By a strange coincidence this Secret Session immediately followed the grant by the Commons of a Return relating to Irish Lunacy accounts. From the meagre official summary we gather that the absence of reporters has at least the negative advantage of shortening speeches. In a very few days, however, the Prime Minister discarded reticence, admitting the gravity of the situation, the prevalence of street fighting, the spread of the insurrection in the West, the appointment of Sir John Maxwell to the supreme command, and the placing of the Irish Government under his orders. The inevitable sequel—the execution of the responsible insurrectionist leaders—has led to vehement protests from Messrs. Dillon and O'Brien against militarist brutality. The House of Commons is a strange place. When Mr. Birrell rose on May 3 to give an account of his nine years' stewardship, the Unionists, and not the Unionists alone, were thinking of a lamp-post in Whitehall. When he had concluded his pathetic apologia and confessed his failure to estimate accurately the strength of Sinn Fein, members were almost ready to fall on his neck, but they no longer wanted his head.



Even Sir Edward Carson admitted that Mr. Birrell had been well intentioned and had done his best. By the middle of the month Mr. Asquith had gone to Ireland, in the hope of discovering some arrangement for the future which would commend itself to all parties. By the 25th he was back in his place after nine days in Dublin. But he had no panacea of his own to prescribe; no cut-and-dried plan for the regeneration of Ireland. All he could say was that Mr. Lloyd George had been deputed by the Cabinet to confer with the various Irish leaders, and the choice is generally approved. If anyone knows how to handle high explosives without causing a premature concussion it should be the Minister of Munitions.

Ireland has dominated the political scene at home, for it is impossible not to connect our new commitments across St. George's Channel with the introduction and passing of the new Military Service Bill establishing compulsion for all men, married or single—always excepting Ireland. The question of man-power is paramount. Mr. Asquith is at last convinced that "Wait and See" must yield to "Do it Now": that the nation won't have the sword of Damocles hanging over its head any longer, but will have compulsion in its hand at once. On the progress of the War Mr. Asquith has said little in Open Session, but any omission on his part has been made good by Mr. Churchill, now home on unlimited leave, who has spoken at great length on the proper use of armies.

Mr. Arthur Ponsonby and Mr. Ramsay MacDonald, who raised the question of Peace on Empire Day, urging the Government to open negotiations with Germany, have elicited from the Foreign Secretary the deliberate statement that the only terms of peace which the German Government had ever put forward were the terms of victory for Germany, and that we could not reason with the German people so long as they were fed with lies.

Mr. Henry James, who so nobly repaid the hospitality England was proud to show him by adopting her nationality in her hour of greatest need, said shortly before his death that nothing grieved him more than the constant loss of England's "best blood, seed and breed." The mothers of England "give their sons," but they know that the choice did not rest with them:

We did not give you—all unasked you went, Sons of a greater motherhood than ours; To our proud hearts your young brief lives were lent, Then swept beyond us by resistless powers. Only we hear, when we have lost our all, That far clear call.

But how can the grief be measured of those

Whose best, Eager to serve a higher quest And in the Great Cause know the joy of battle, Gallant and young, by traitor hands, Leagued with a foe from alien lands, Struck down in cold blood, fell like butchered cattle?

Though Ireland is not for the moment a source of humour she contrives to be the cause of it in others. A daily paper tells us that Sir Robert Chalmers is to be "Permanent Under-Secretary of Ireland pro tem." Another daily paper, the Daily Mail, to be precise, has discovered a new test of valour: "Mr. Hellish, a regular reader of the Daily Mail for years, was awarded the V.C. last month for conspicuous bravery."



June, 1916.

At last the long vigil in the North Sea has ended in the glorious if indecisive battle of Jutland, the greatest sea fight since Trafalgar. Yet was it indecisive? After the momentary dismay caused by the first Admiralty communique with its over-estimate of our losses, public confidence, shaken where it was strongest, has been restored by further information and by the admissions of the enemy. We have to mourn the loss of many ships, still more the loss of splendid ships' companies and their heroic captains. We can sympathise with the cruel disappointment of those who, after bearing the brunt of the action, were robbed of the opportunity of overwhelming their enemy by failing light and the exigencies of a strategy governed in the last resort by political caution. But look at the sequel. The German Fleet, badly battered, retires to port; and despite the paeans of exultation from their Admirals, Kaiser, and Imperial Chancellor, remains there throughout the month. Will it ever come out again? Meanwhile, Wilhelmshaven is closed indefinitely, and nobody is allowed to see those sheep in Wolff's clothing—the "victorious fleet." The true verdict, so far as we can judge, may be expressed in homely phrase: The British Navy has taken a knock but given a harder one. We can stand it and they can't.



Within a week of Jutland the Empire has been stirred to its depths by the tragic death of Lord Kitchener in the Hampshire, blown up by a mine off the Shetlands on her voyage to Archangel. On the eve of starting on his mission to Russia his last official act had been to meet his critics of the House of Commons face to face, reply to their questions and leave them silenced and admiring. On the day of the battle of Jutland these critics had moved the Prime Minister to declare that Lord Kitchener was personally entitled to the credit for the amazing expansion of the army. Sir Mark Sykes, no mean authority, asserted that in Germany our War Secretary was feared as a great organiser, while in the East his name was one to conjure with; and Sir George Reid, a worthy representative of the Dominions, observed that his chief fault was that he was "not clever at circulating the cheap coin of calculated civilities which enable inferior men to rise to positions to which they are not entitled." These tributes were delivered in his lifetime; they deserve to be contrasted with the appreciations of those journalists who clamoured for his appointment, then clamoured for his dismissal, and profaned his passing with their insincere eulogies. Three weeks of Recess elapsed before the Houses could render homage to the illustrious dead. In the Lords the debt has been paid by a statesman, Lord Lansdowne, a soldier, Lord French, and a friend, Lord Derby. In the Commons the speeches were all touched with genuine emotion and the sense of personal loss. Through all these various tributes rang the note of duty well done, and Mr. Bonar Law did well to remind the House of the sure instinct which caused Lord Kitchener to realise at the very outset the gigantic nature of the present War. In a sense his loss is irreparable, yet his great work was accomplished before he died. Sometimes accused of expecting others to achieve the impossible, he had achieved it himself in the crowning miracle of his life, the improvisation of the New Armies.

The violation of Greek territory by the Bulgarian troops, as might be expected, has not led to any effective protest from King Constantine. On the contrary, one seems to hear this benevolent neutral deprecating any apology on the part of King Ferdinand: "Please make yourself at home. This is Liberty Hall."

It is otherwise with the irruption of the Russians under General Brusiloff. His great offensive is a source of offence to the Austrians, who have good reason to complain that the "steam-roller" is exceeding the speed limit. Or to change the metaphor, the bear and his tormentor have changed places.

Ireland has receded a little from her place in the limelight, and though debates on martial law continue, and Irish members ask an inordinate number of questions arising out of the hot Easter week in Dublin, the temperature is no longer "98 in the shade" as a local wit described it at the time. Ministers are extremely economical of information: the anticipated settlement still hangs fire, and there are increasing fears that it will not hold water.



A number of professional fortune-tellers have been fined at Southend for having predicted Zeppelins. The fraudulent nature of their pretensions was sufficiently manifest, since even the authorities had been unable to foresee the Zeppelins until some time after they had arrived.

The discussions in Parliament and out of it of the way in which things get into the papers which oughtn't to, are dying down. A daily paper, however, has revived them by the headline, "Cabinet leekage." Now, why, in wonder, do they spell it in that way?

It is quite impossible to keep pace with all the new incarnations of women in war-time—'bus-conductress, ticket-collector, lift-girl, club waitress, post-woman, bank clerk, motor-driver, farm-labourer, guide, munition maker. There is nothing new in the function of ministering angel: the myriad nurses in hospital here or abroad are only carrying out, though in greater numbers than ever before, what has always been woman's mission. But whenever he sees one of these new citizens, or hears fresh stories of their address and ability, Mr. Punch is proud and delighted. Perhaps in the past, even in the present, he may have been, or even still is, a little given to chaff Englishwomen for some of their foibles, and even their aspirations. But he never doubted how splendid they were at heart; he never for a moment supposed they would be anything but ready and keen when the hour of need struck.



July, 1916.

On the home front we have long been accustomed to the sound of guns, small and great, but it has come from training camps and inspires confidence rather than anxiety. We have been spared the horrors of invasion, occupation, wholesale devastation. In certain areas the noise of bombs and anti-aircraft guns has grown increasingly familiar, and on our south-east and east coasts war from the air, on the sea, and under the sea has become more and more audible as the months pass by. But July has brought us a new experience—the sound fifty or sixty miles inland in peaceful rural England, amid glorious midsummer weather, of the continual throbbing night and day of the great guns on the Somme, where our first great offensive opened on the 1st, and has continued with solid and substantial gains, some set-backs, heavy losses for the Allies, still heavier for the enemy. Names of villages and towns, which hitherto have been to most of us mere names on the map, have now become luminous through shining deeds of glory and sacrifice—Contalmaison and Mametz, Delville Wood, Thiepval and Beaumont-Hamel, Serre and Pozieres.

The victory, for victory it is, has not been celebrated in the German way. England takes her triumphs as she takes defeats, without a sign of having turned a hair:

Yet we are proud because at last, at last We look upon the dawn of our desire; Because the weary waiting-time is passed And we have tried our temper in the fire; And proving word by deed Have kept the faith we pledged to France at need.

But most because, from mine and desk and mart, Springing to face a task undreamed before, Our men, inspired to play their prentice part Like soldiers lessoned in the school of war, True to their breed and name, Went flawless through the fierce baptismal flame.

And he who brought these armies into life, And on them set the impress of his will— Could he be moved by sound of mortal strife, There where he lies, their Captain, cold and still Under the shrouding tide, How would his great heart stir and glow with pride!



The results of the battle of the Somme are shown in a variety of ways: by the reticence and admissions of the German Press, by its efforts to divert attention to the exploits of the commercial submarine cruiser Deutschland; above all, by the Kaiser's fresh explosions of piety. "The Devil was sick, the Devil a monk would be." There is no further sign of his fleet, which remains crippled by its "victory." Nor can he, still less his Ally, draw comfort from the situation on the Russian or Italian fronts.



Mr. Punch finds the usual difficulty in getting any details from his correspondents when they have been or are in the thick of the fighting. Practically all that they have to say is that there was a "damned noise," that breakfast was delayed by the "morning hate," or that an angry sub besought a weary O.C. "to ask our gunners not to serve faults into our front line wire." One of them, however, a very wise young man, ventures on the prediction that the War will last well into 1918. As the result of a brief leave he has learned an important truth. "In England they assume that you, having just arrived from France, know. When you return to France, it is assumed that you, having just arrived from England, know."

In Parliament Ireland is beginning to suffer from a rival in unenviable notoriety. Mesopotamia does not smell particularly sweet just now, but that may add to its usefulness as a red herring. Geographers are said to have some difficulty in defining its exact boundaries, but the Government are probably quite convinced that it is situate between the Devil and the Deep Sea. Two Special Commissions are to be set up to inquire into the Mesopotamian and Dardanelles Expeditions. Public opinion has been painfully stirred by the harrowing details which have come to light of the preventible sufferings endured by British troops. From their point of view the supply of their medical needs, now guaranteed, is worth a wilderness of Special Commissions. But Ireland still holds the floor, though Mr. Asquith is frugal of information as to the prospective Irish Bill and has deprecated discussion of the Hardinge Report, the most scarifying public document of our times. The Lords, unembarrassed by any embargo, have discussed the Report in a spirit which must make Mr. Birrell thank his stars that he got in his confession first. But why, he may ask, should he be judged by Lord Hardinge, himself a prospective defendant at the bar of public opinion?

Following the lead of a certain section of the Press, certain Members have begun to wax vocal on the subject of reprisals, uninterned Aliens, and the Hidden Hand. Their appeals to the Home Office to go on the spy-trail have not met with much sympathy so far. An alleged Austrian taxi-driver has turned out to be a harmless Scotsman with an impediment in his speech. More interesting has been the sudden re-emergence of Mr. John Burns. He sank without a trace two years ago, but has now bobbed up to denounce the proposal to strengthen the Charing Cross railway-bridge. We could have wished that he had been ready to "keep the bridge" in another sense; but at least he has been a silent Pacificist. Mr. Winston Churchill, when his journalistic labours permit, has contributed to the debates, and Lord Haldane has again delivered his famous lecture on the defects of English education. But for Parliamentary sagacity in excelsis commend us to Mr. McCallum Scott. He is seriously perturbed about the shortage of sausage-skins and, in spite of the bland assurance of Mr. Harcourt that supplies are ample, is alleged to be planning a fresh campaign with the assistance of Mr. Hogge. Another shortage has given rise to no anxiety, but rather the reverse. In a police court it was recently stated that there are no longer any tramps in England. Evidently the appeal of that stirring old song, "Tramp! tramp! tramp! the boys are marching," has not been without its effect.



Yet another endurable shortage is reported from the seaside, where an old sailor on the local sea front has been lamenting the spiritual starvation brought about by the war. "Why," he said, "for the first time for twenty years we ain't got no performing fleas down here." And performers, when they do come, are not always successful in riveting the attention of their audience.



August, 1916.

The third year of the War opens well for the Allies; so well that the Kaiser has again issued a statement denying that he is responsible for it. The Big Push on the Somme goes on steadily, thanks to fine leadership, the steadfast heroism of the New Armies, and the loyal co-operation of the munition-workers at home, who have deferred their holiday rather than hamper their brothers in the trenches by a lessened output.

Here one fact may suffice as a sample. The weekly consumption of high explosives by the Army is now between eleven and twelve thousand times as much as it was in September, 1914. Yet when a lieutenant is asked to state what it is really like being along with the B.E.F. when it is in its pushful mood, he sedulously eschews heroics, and will not commit himself to saying more than that it's all right—that he doesn't think there is any cause for anxiety. "We seem to have ceased to have sensations out here. It is a matter of business; the only question is how long is it going to take to complete." So, too, with the Tommies. "Wonderful," declares the man in the ranks to persistent seekers after thrilling descriptions of war. "You never see the like. Across in them trenches there was real soda-water in bottles." To return to our lieutenant, he "simply can't help being a little sorry for the Boche now that his wild oats are coming home to roost." Even his poetic friends, formerly soulful and precious, take this restrained view. The Attributes of the Enemy are thus summed up by one trench bard:

If Boches laughed and Huns were gents, They'd own their share of continents; There'd be no fuss, and, what is more, There wouldn't even be a war. Whereas the end of all this tosh Can only be there'll be no Boche.



Another poet, an R.F.C. man, adopts the same vein, void alike of hate or exultation:

Returning from my morning fly I met a Fokker in the sky, And, judging from its swift descent, It had a nasty accident. On thinking further of the same I rather fear I was to blame.

It is easy to understand why the enemy nations find England so disappointing and unsatisfying to be at war with.

Italy, too, has had her Big Push on the Isonzo, capturing Monte Sabotino, which had defied her for fifteen months, and Gorizia—a triumph of scientific preparation and intrepid assault. The Austrian poison-gas attack on the Asiago plateau has been avenged, and the objectives of the long and ineffectual offensive of the previous winter carried with thousands of prisoners at a comparatively cheap price. To add to Austria's humiliation her armies on the Eastern Front have been placed under the Prussian Hindenburg. And Rumania has joined the Allies at the end of what has been a very bad month for the Central Empires. English newspapers have been excluded from Germany, and Berlin has added truthless to meatless days. But the Germans have long since found a substitute for veracity as well as for leather and butter and rubber and bread. They are said to have found a substitute for International Law, and it is an open secret that they are even now in search of a substitute for victory. We might even suggest a few more substitutes which have not yet been utilised. As, for example, a substitute for Verdun with the German flag flying over it; substitutes for several German Colonies; a substitute for Austria as an ally; and substitutes for Kultur and Organisation and Efficiency and World Power and the Mailed Fist and the Crown Prince and the Kaiser and the War and all the things that haven't come off.

Various momentous decisions have been arrived at in Parliament. The Cabinet are not to be cinematographed, and unnecessary taxi-whistling is to be suppressed, without any prejudice to the squealing of importunate chatterers below the gangway. Ireland has again dominated the Parliamentary scene; the Nationalists have resumed their freedom of action with attacks on Sir John Maxwell and martial law, and are displaying an embarrassing industry reminiscent of the 'Eighties. Mr. Ginnell has been removed by order of the Speaker; Mr. Duke has succeeded Mr. Birrell; and the discussion of three Irish Bills has bulked so large that one might almost forget we were at war. In such brief moments as could be spared from Irish affairs the Premier has proposed a fresh Vote of Credit for 450 millions, has introduced a Bill for extending the life of Parliament, and another establishing a new Register. The last has been unmercifully belaboured in debate, the Prime Minister himself describing it as "a halting, lopsided, temporary makeshift." The apparently insoluble problem is that of enabling soldiers in the trenches to exercise the franchise. Soldiers and sailors can very well wait for their votes, but not for their money, and the delays in providing pensions for discharged men have been condemned by members of all parties. So the War is not altogether forgotten by the House. Mr. Lloyd George, the new War Secretary, without wasting breath on the pessimistic comments of his colleague Mr. Churchill, has given an encouraging survey of the general situation. The cry has gone up that Mr. Hughes Must Come Back from Australia, and Mr. Swift MacNeill has been rewarded for his pertinacity by extracting a promise from Mr. Asquith that he will purge the Peerage of its enemy Dukes. Better still is the solemn assurance of the Premier that the Government are taking steps to discover the identity of all those who are in any way responsible for the judicial murder of Captain Fryatt—the worst instance of calculated atrocity against non-combatants since the murder of Nurse Cavell.

The education of our New Armies is full of strange and noble surprises. Now it is an ex-shop boy converted into an R.H.A. driver. Or again it is a Tommy learning to appreciate the heroism of a French peasant woman:

'Er bloke's out scrappin' with the rest, Pushin' a bay'net in Argonne; She wears 'is photo on 'er breast, "Mon Jean," she sez—the French for John.

She 'ears the guns boom night an' day; She sees the shrapnel burstin' black; The sweaty columns march away, The stretchers bringin' of 'em back.

She ain't got no war-leggin's on; 'Er picture's never in the Press, Out scoutin'. She finds breeks "no bon," An' carries on in last year's dress.

At dawn she tows a spotty cow To graze upon the village green; She plods for miles be'ind a plough, An' takes our washin' in between.

She tills a patch o' spuds besides, An' burnt like copper in the sun, She tosses 'ay all day, then rides The 'orse 'ome when the job is done.

The times is 'ard—I got me woes, With blistered feet an' this an' that, An' she's got 'ers, the good Lord knows, Although she never chews the fat.

But when the Boche 'as gulped 'is pill, An' crawled 'ome to 'is bloomin' Spree, We'll go upon the bust, we will, Madame an' Monsieur Jean an' me.

Or once more it is the young officer shaving himself in a captured German dug-out before an old looking-glass looted from a chateau by a dead German, and apologising to its rightful owner:

Madame, at the end of this long campaign, When France comes into her own again In the setting where only she can shine, As you in your mirror of rare design— Forgive me, who dare In a German lair To shave in your mirror at Pozieres.

Then there are "lonely soldiers" in India, envious of their more fortunate comrades in Flanders, and soldiers quite the reverse of lonely during their well-earned leave.



The education of those on the Home Front is also proceeding. There are some maids who announce the approach of Zeppelins as if they were ordinary visitors. There are others who politely decline to exchange a seat at an attic window for the security of the basement.



According to the German papers Prince Frederick Leopold of Prussia has been severely reprimanded by the Kaiser for permitting his wild swine to escape from their enclosure and damage neighbouring property. It would be interesting to know if Prince Leopold excused himself on the ground that he had merely followed the All Highest's distinguished example. When Princes are rebuked common editors cannot hope to escape censure. The editor of the Vorwaerts has again been arrested, the reason given being that the newspaper does not truthfully represent Germany's position in the War. If the title of the organ is any indication of its contents the charge would appear to be more than justified.



September, 1916.

"IAN HAY" wrote a fine book on "The First Hundred Thousand"—the first batch of Kitchener's Army. Another book, equally glorious, remains to be written about another Hundred Thousand—the Sweepers of the Sea. And with them are to be reckoned the heroes of the little ships of whom we hear naught save the laconic record in a daily paper that "the small steamer ——— struck a mine yesterday and sank," and that all the crew were lost:

Who to the deep in ships go down, Great marvels do behold, But comes the day when some must drown In the grey sea and cold. For galleons lost great bells do toll, But now we must implore God's ear for sunken Little Ships Who are not heard of more.

When ships of war put out to sea, They go with guns and mail, That so the chance may equal be Should foemen them assail; But Little Ships men's errands run, And are not clad for strife; God's mercy, then, on Little Ships Who cannot fight for life.

To warm and cure, to clothe and feed, They stoutly put to sea, And since that men of them had need Made light of jeopardy; Each in her hour her fate did meet, Nor flinched nor made outcry; God's love be with these Little Ships Who could not choose but die.

To friar and nun, and every one Who lives to save and tend, Sisters were these whose work is done And cometh thus to end; Full well they knew what risk they ran But still were strong to give; God's grace for all the Little Ships Who died that men might live.

September has brought us good tidings by land and air. Thiepval and Combles are ours, and the plague of the Zeppelins has been stayed. The downing of the Zepp at Cuffley by Lieutenant Robinson gave North London the most thrilling aerial spectacle ever witnessed. There has been much diversity of opinion as to the safest place to be in during a Zeppelin raid—under cover or in the open, on the top floor or in the basement; but recent experiences suggest that by far the most dangerous place on those occasions is in a Zeppelin. But perhaps the most momentous event of the month has been the coming of the Tanks, a most humorous and formidable addition to the fauna of the battlefield—half battleship, half caterpillar—which have given the Germans the surprise of their lives, a surprise all the more effective for being sudden and complete. The Germans, no doubt, have their surprise packets in store for us, but we can safely predict that they are not likely to be at once so comic and so efficient as these unlovely but painstaking monsters. As an officer at the front writes to a friend: "These animals look so dreadfully competent, I am quite sure they can swim. Thus, any day now, as you go to your business in the City, you may meet one of them trundling up Ludgate Hill, looking like nothing on earth and not behaving like a gentleman." As for the relations between the Allies in the field the same correspondent contributes some enlightening details. The French aren't English and the English aren't French, and difficulties are bound to arise. The course of true love never did run smooth. Here it started, as it generally does, with a rush; infatuation was succeeded by friction, and that in turn by the orthodox aftermath of reconciliation. "How do we stand now? We have settled down to one of those attachments which have such an eternity before them in the future that they permit of no gushing in the present." The War goes well on the Western Front, the worst news being the report that the Kaiser has undertaken to refrain in future from active participation in the conduct of military operations.



Peace reigns at Westminster, where legislators are agreeably conspicuous by their absence. But other agencies are active. According to an advertisement in the Nation the Fabian Research Department have issued two Reports, "together with a Project for a Supernatural Authority that will Prevent War." The egg, on the authority of the Daily Mail, is "disappearing from our breakfast table," but even the humblest of us can still enjoy our daily mare's nest. The effect of the Zeppelin on the young has already been shown; but even the elderly own its stimulating influence.



October, 1916.

Mr. Punch's correspondents at the Front have an incorrigible habit of euphemism and levity. Even when things go well they are never betrayed into heroics, but adhere to the schoolboy formula of "not half bad," just as in the blackest hours they would not admit that things were more than "pretty beastly." Yet sometimes they deviate for a moment into really enlightening comment. No better summary of the situation as it stands in the third year of the War can be given than in the words of the faithful "Watch-dog," who has long been on duty in trench and dug-out and crater-hole:—

"This War has ceased to become an occupation befitting a gentleman—gentleman, that is, of the true Prussian breed. It was a happy and honourable task so long as it consisted of civilising the world at large with high explosive, poisonous gas and burning oil, and the world at large was not too ready to answer back. To persist in this stern business, in face of the foolish and ignoble obstinacy of the adversary, required great courage and strength of mind; but the Prussian is essentially courageous and strong. Things came to a pretty pass, however, when the wicked adversary made himself some guns and shells and took to being stern on his own. People who behave like that, especially after they have been conquered, are not to be mixed with—anything to keep aloof from such. One had to leave Combles, one had to leave Thiepval, one may even have to leave Bapaume to avoid the pest; these nasty French and English persons, with their disgusting tanks, intrude everywhere nowadays." The German engineer is being hoist with his own petard:

Yet you may suck sweet solace from the thought That not in vain the seed was sown, That half the recent havoc we have wrought Was based on methods all your own; And smile to hear our heavy batteries Pound you with imitation's purest flatteries.

Yet, at best, this is sorry comfort for the Kaiser.



It is not a picnic for the men in our front line. Reports that the situation is "normal" or "quiet" or "uneventful" represent more or less correctly what is happening at G.H.Q., Divisional Headquarters, Brigade Headquarters, or even Battalion Headquarters. They represent understatement to the nth when applied to the front trenches. But listen again to the "Watch-dog." He admits that some of our diamonds are not smooth, but adds "for myself I welcome every touch of nature in these our warriors. It is good to be in the midst of them, for they thrive as never before, and their comforts are few enough these wet bloody days."

The Crown Prince, after seven months of ineffective carnage before Verdun, has been giving an interview to an American ex-clergyman, representing the Hearst anti-British newspapers, in which he appears in the light of a tender-hearted philanthropist, longing for peace, mercy, and the delights of home-life. Mr. Lloyd George, in an interview with an American journalist, has defined our policy as that of delivering a "knock out" to Prussian military despotism, a pugilistic metaphor which has wounded some of our Pacificists. Our Zeppelin bag is growing; Count Zeppelin has sworn to destroy London or die, but now that John Bull is getting his eye in, the oath savours of suicide.



The Allies have presented an ultimatum to Greece, but Mr. Asquith's appeal to the traditions of ancient Hellas is wasted on King Constantine, who, if he had lived in the days of Marathon and Salamis, would undoubtedly have been a pro-Persian. As for his future, Mr. Punch ventures on a prediction:

Tino, if some day Hellas should arise A phoenix soaring from her present cinders, Think not to share her passage to the skies Or furnish purple copy for her Pindars; You'll be in exile, if you don't take care, Along with brother William, Lord knows where!

A couple of months ago, on the occasion of sharks appearing on the Atlantic coast of the U.S.A., it was freely intimated at the fashionable watering-places that there was such a thing as being too proud to bathe. Now a new and untimely irritant has turned up off the same shores in the shape of U-boats. Their advent is all the more inconsiderate in view of the impending Presidential Election, at which Mr. Wilson's claim is based on having kept America out of the War.



Members have returned to St. Stephen's refreshed by seven weeks' holiday, and the Nationalists have been recruiting their energies, but unfortunately nothing else, in Ireland. By way of signalising his restoration, after an apology, Mr. Ginnell handed in thirty-nine questions—the fruits of his enforced leisure. The woes of the interned Sinn Feiners who have been condemned to sleep in a disused distillery at Frongoch have been duly brought forward and the House invited to declare that "the system of government at present maintained in Ireland is inconsistent with the principles for which the Allies are fighting in Europe." The system of administration in Ireland is, and always has been, inconsistent with any settled principles whatsoever; but to propose such a motion now is equivalent to affirming that Ireland is being treated by Great Britain as Belgium and Poland and Serbia have been treated by Germany. Mr. Redmond made no attempt to prove this absurd thesis, but when he demanded that martial law should be withdrawn and the interned rebels let loose in a Home-ruled Ireland—while the embers of the rebellion were still dangerously smouldering—he asked too much even of that amicable and trustful beast, the British Lion. Mr. Duke is not exactly a sparkling orator, but he said one thing which needed saying, namely, that Irishmen ought to work out a scheme of Home Rule for themselves, and lay it before Parliament, instead of expecting Englishmen to do their work for them and then complaining of the result. In the division-lobby the Nationalists received the assistance of some forty or fifty British Members, who supported the motion, Mr. Punch suspects, more out of hatred of the Coalition than of love for Ireland. But they were easily out-voted by British Home Rulers alone. The impression left by the debate was that the Nationalist Members had a great deal more sympathy with the Sinn Feiners than they had with the innocent victims of the rebellion.



The need of a War propaganda at home is illustrated by the answers to correspondents in the Leeds Mercury. "Reasonable questions" are invited, and here is one of the answers: "T.B.—No, it is not General Sir William Robertson, but the Rev. Sir William Robertson Nicoll who edits The British Weekly." But then, as another journal pathetically observes, "About nine-tenths of what we say is of no earthly importance to anybody." Further light is thrown on this confession by the claim of an Islington applicant for exemption: "Once I was a circus clown, but now I am on an evening newspaper."

We are grateful to Russia for her efforts, but, as our artist shows above, the plain person is apparently uncertain as to the quality of our Ally.

We are glad to learn that, on the suggestion of Mr. Asquith, the Lord Mayor's banquet will be "of a simple nature." Apropos of diet, an officer expecting leave writes: "My London programme is fixed; first a Turkish bath, and then a nice fried sole." History repeats itself. A fried sole was the luxury which officers who served in the Boer War declared that they enjoyed most of all after their campaigning.



November, 1916.

Francis Joseph of Austria has died on the tottering throne which has been his for nearly seventy years. In early days he had been hated, but he had shown valour. Later on he had shown wisdom, and had been pitied for his misfortunes. It was a crowning irony of fate which condemned him in old age to become the dupe and tool of an Assassin. He should have died before the War—certainly before the tragedy of Sarajevo.

The British Push has extended to the Ancre, and the Crown Prince, reduced to the position of a pawn in Hindenburg's game, maintains a precarious hold on the remote suburbs of Verdun. Well may he be sick, after nine months of futile carnage, of a name which already ranks in renown with Thermopylae.

As the credit of the Crown Prince wanes, so the cult of Hindenburg waxes.



Monastir has been recaptured by the Serbians and French; but Germany has had her victories too, and, continuing her warfare against the Red Cross, has sunk two hospital ships. Germany's U-boat policy is going to win her the War. At least so Marshal Hindenburg says, and the view is shared by that surprising person the neutral journalist. But in the meantime it subjects the affections of the neutral sailorman to a severe trial.

King Constantine, however, remains unshaken in his devotion to German interests. He has also shown marked originality by making up a Cabinet exclusively composed of University Professors. But some critics scent in his action a hint of compulsory Ministerial Service, and predict Labour troubles.

At home we have to note the steady set of the tide of public opinion in favour of Food Control. The name of the Dictator is not yet declared, but the announcement cannot be long postponed. Whoever he may be, he is not to be envied. We have also to note the steady growth on every side of Government bungalows—the haunts (if some critics are to be believed) of the Great Uncombed, even of the Hidden Hand. The men of forty-one were not wanted last March. Mr. Lloyd George tells us that they are wanted now, or it would mean the loss of two Army Corps. The Germans, by the way, appear to be arriving at a just conception of their relative value. Lord Newton has informed the Lords that the enemy is prepared to release 600 English civilian prisoners in return for some 4,000 to 7,000 Germans. Parliament has developed a new grievance: Ministers have confided to Pressmen information denied to M.P.'s. And a cruel wrong has been done to Erin, according to Mr. Dillon, by the application of Greenwich time to Ireland, by which that country has been compelled to surrender its precious privilege of being twenty-five minutes behind the times. The injustice is so bitter that it has reconciled Mr. Dillon and Mr. Healy.

The Premier has hinted that if the House insisted on having fuller information than it receives at present another Secret Session might be held. When one considers the vital problems on which Parliament now concentrates its energies—the supply of cocaine to dentists, the withholding of pictures of the Tanks, etc.—one feels that there should be a Secret Session at least once a week. Indeed, if the House were to sit permanently with closed doors, unobserved and unreported, the country might be all the better for it.



It is the fashion in some quarters to make out that fathers do not realise the sacrifice made by their sons, but complacently acquiesce in it while they sit comfortably at home over the fire. Mr. Punch has not met these fathers. The fathers—and still more the mothers—that he knows recognise only too well the unpayable nature of their debt.

They held, against the storms of fate, In war's tremendous game, A little land inviolate Within a world of flame.

They looked on scarred and ruined lands, On shell-wrecked fields forlorn, And gave to us, with open hands, Full fields of yellow corn;

The silence wrought in wood and stone Whose aisles our fathers trod; The pines that stand apart, alone, Like sentinels of God.

With generous hands they paid the price, Unconscious of the cost, But we must gauge the sacrifice By all that they have lost.

The joy of young adventurous ways, Of keen and undimmed sight, The eager tramp through sunny days, The dreamless sleep of night,

The happy hours that come and go, In youth's untiring quest, They gave, because they willed it so, With some light-hearted jest.

No lavish love of future years, No passionate regret, No gift of sacrifice or tears Can ever pay the debt.

Yet if ever you try to express this indebtedness to the wonderful young men who survive, they turn the whole thing into a jest and tell you, for example, that only two things really interest them, "Europe and their stomachs"—nothing in between matters.



Guy Fawkes Day has come and gone without fireworks, pursuant to the Defence of the Realm Act. Even Parliament omitted to sit. Apropos of Secret Sessions, Lord Northcliffe has been accused of having had one all to himself and some five hundred other gentlemen at a club luncheon. The Daily Mail describes the debate on the subject as a "gross waste of time," which seems to come perilously near lese-majeste! But then, as a writer in the Evening News—another Northcliffe paper—safely observes, "It is the failing of many people to say what they think without thinking."



December, 1916.

Rumania has unhappily given Germany the chance of a cheap and spectacular triumph—of which, after being badly pounded on the Somme, she was sorely in need. Here was a comparatively small nation, whom the Germans could crush under their heel as they had crushed Belgium and Serbia. So in Rumania they concentrated all the men they could spare from other fronts and put them under their best generals. Their first plans were thwarted, but eventually the big guns had their way and Bukarest fell. Then, after the usual display of bunting and joy-bells in Berlin, was the moment to make a noble offer of peace. The German peace overtures remind one of Mr. Punch's correspondents of the American advertisement: "If John Robinson, with whose wife I eloped six months ago, will take her back, all will be forgiven."

The shadowy proposals of those who preach humanity while they practise unrestricted frightfulness have not deceived the Allies. They know, and have let the enemy know, that they must go on until they have made sure of an enduring peace by reducing the Central Empires to impotence for evil.

When Mr. Asquith announced in the House on December 4 the King's approval of Reconstruction, few Members guessed that in twenty-four hours he would have ceased to be Prime Minister and that Mr. Lloyd George would have begun Cabinet-making. There has been much talk of intrigue. But John Bull doesn't care who leads the country so long as he leads it to victory. And as for Certain People Somewhere in France, we shall probably not be far wrong in interpreting their view of the present change as follows:

Thank God, we keep no politicians here; Fighting's our game, not talking; all we ask Is men and means to face the coming year And consummate our task.

Give us the strongest leaders you can find, Tory or Liberal, not a toss care we, So they are swift to act and know their mind Too well to wait and see.



The ultimate verdict on Mr. Asquith's services to the State as Prime Minister for the first two and a half years of the War will not be founded on the Press Campaign which has helped to secure his downfall. But, as one of the most bitterly and unjustly assailed ex-Ministers has said, "personal reputations must wait till the end of the War." Meanwhile, we have a Premier who, whatever his faults, cannot be charged with supineness.



Mr. Bonar Law, the new Leader of the House, has made his first appearance as Chancellor of the Exchequer. Moving a further Vote of Credit for 400 millions, he disclosed the fact that the daily cost of the War was nearer six than five millions. In regard to the peace proposals he found himself unable to better the late Prime Minister's statement that the Allies would require "adequate reparation for the past and adequate security for the future." In lucidity and dignity of statement Mr. Asquith was certainly above criticism. Lord Devonport has been appointed Food Controller and warned us of rigours to come. The most thrilling speech heard at Westminster this month has been that of Major Willie Redmond, fresh from the invigorating atmosphere of the front. While some seventy odd Nationalist Members are mainly occupied in brooding over Ireland's woes, two are serving in the trenches—William Redmond and Stephen Gwynn, both of them middle-aged men. O si sic omnes!

Our wounded need all their patience to put up with the curiosity of non-combatants. A lady, after asking a Tommy on leave what the stripes on his arm were for, being told that they were one for each time he was wounded, is reported to have observed, "Dear me! How extraordinary that you should be wounded three times in the same place!" Even real affection is not always happily expressed.



The tenderness with which King Constantine is still treated, even after the riot in Athens in which our bluejackets have been badly mishandled, is taxing the patience of moderate men. Mr. Punch, for example, exasperated by the cumulative effect of Tino's misdeeds, has been goaded into making a formidable forecast of surrender or exit:

You say your single aim is just to use Your regal gifts for your beloved nation; Why, then, I see the obvious line to choose, Meaning, of course, the path of abdication; Make up your so-called mind—I frankly would— To leave your country for your country's good.

The German Emperor was prevented from being present at the funeral of the late Emperor Francis Joseph by a chill. One is tempted to think that in a lucid interval of self-criticism William of Hohenzollern may have wished to spare his aged victim this crowning mockery.

Motto for Meatless Days: "The time is out of joint." This is a raison de plus for establishing an Entente in the kitchen and getting Marianne to show Britannia how to cook a cabbage.



January, 1917.

Though the chariots of War still drive heavily, 1917 finds the Allies in good heart—"war-weary but war-hardened." The long agony of Verdun has ended in triumph for the French, and Great Britain has answered the Peace Talk of Berlin by calling a War Conference of the Empire. The New Year has brought us a new Prime Minister, a new Cabinet, a new style of Minister. Captains of Commerce are diverted from their own business for the benefit of the country. In spite of all rumours to the contrary Lord Northcliffe remains outside the new Government, but his interest in it is, at present, friendly. It is very well understood, however, that everyone must behave. And in this context Mr. Punch feels that a tribute is due to the outgoing Premier. Always reserved and intent, he discouraged Press gossip to such a degree as actually to have turned the key on the Tenth Muse. Interviewers had no chance. He came into office, held it and left it without a single concession to Demos' love of personalia.



Germany has not yet changed her Chancellor, though he is being bitterly attacked for his "silly ideas of humanity"—and her rulers have certainly shown no change of heart. General von Bissing's retirement from Belgium is due to health, not repentance. The Kaiser still talks of his "conscience" and "courage" in freeing the world from the pressure which weighs upon all. He is still the same Kaiser and Constantine the same "Tino," who, as the Berliner Tageblatt bluntly remarks, "has as much right to be heard as a common criminal." Yet signs are not wanting of misgivings in the German people.

Mr. Wilson has launched a new phrase on the world—"Peace without Victory"; but War is not going to be ended by phrases, and the man who is doing more than anyone else to end it—the British infantryman—has no use for them:

The gunner rides on horseback, he lives in luxury, The sapper has his dug-out as cushy as can be, The flying man's a sportsman, but his home's a long way back, In painted tent or straw-spread barn or cosy little shack; Gunner and sapper and flying man (and each to his job say I) Have tickled the Hun with mine or gun or bombed him from on high, But the quiet work, and the dirty work, since ever the War began, Is the work that never shows at all, the work of the infantryman.

The guns can pound the villages and smash the trenches in, And the Hun is fain for home again when the T.M.B.s begin, And the Vickers gun is a useful one to sweep a parapet, But the real work is the work that's done with bomb and bayonet. Load him down from heel to crown with tools and grub and kit, He's always there where the fighting is—he's there unless he's hit; Over the mud and the blasted earth he goes where the living can; He's in at the death while he yet has breath, the British infantryman!

Trudge and slip on the shell-hole's lip, and fall in the clinging mire— Steady in front, go steady! Close up there! Mind the wire! Double behind where the pathways wind! Jump clear of the ditch, jump clear! Lost touch at the back? Oh, halt in front! And duck when the shells come near! Carrying parties all night long, all day in a muddy trench, With your feet in the wet and your head in the rain and the sodden khaki's stench! Then over the top in the morning, and onward all you can— This is the work that wins the War, the work of the infantryman.

And if anyone should think that this means the permanent establishment of militarism in our midst let him be comforted by the saying of an old sergeant-major when asked to give a character of one of his men. "He's a good man in the trenches, and a good man in a scrap; but you'll never make a soldier of him." The new armies fight all the harder because they want to make an end not of this war but of all wars. As for the regulars, there is no need to enlarge on their valour. But it is pleasant to put on record the description of an officer's servant which has reached Mr. Punch from France: "Valet, cook, porter, boots, chamber-maid, ostler, carpenter, upholsterer, mechanic, inventor, needlewoman, coalheaver, diplomat, barber, linguist (home-made), clerk, universal provider, complete pantechnicon and infallible bodyguard, he is also a soldier, if a very old soldier, and a man of the most human kind."

Parliament is not sitting, but there is, unfortunately, no truth in the report that in order to provide billets for 5,000 new typists and incidentally to win the War, the Government has commandeered the Houses of Parliament. The Times Literary Supplement received 335 books of original verse in 1916, and it is rumoured that Mr. Edward Marsh may very shortly take up his duties as Minister of Poetry and the Fine Arts. Mr. Marsh has not yet decided whether he will appoint Mr. Asquith or Mr. Winston Churchill as his private secretary. Meanwhile, a full list of the private secretaries of the new private secretaries of the members of the new Government may at any moment be disclosed to a long suffering public.

On the Home Front the situation shows that a famous literary critic was also a true prophet:

O Matthew Arnold! You were right: We need more Sweetness and more Light; For till we break the brutal foe, Our sugar's short, our lights are low.

The domestic problem daily grows more acute. A maid, who asked for a rise in her wages to which her mistress demurred, explained that the gentleman she walked out with had just got a job in a munition factory and she would be obliged to dress up to him.



Maids are human, however, though their psychology is sometimes disconcerting. One who was told by her mistress not to worry because her young man had gone into the trenches responded cheerfully, "Oh, no, ma'am, I've left off worrying now. He can't walk out with anyone else while he's there."



February 1917,

The rulers of Germany—the Kaiser and his War-lords—proclaimed themselves the enemies of the human race in the first weeks of the War. But it has taken two years and a half to break down the apparently inexhaustible patience of the greatest of the neutrals. A year and three-quarters has elapsed since the sinking of the Lusitania. The forbearance of President Wilson—in the face of accumulated insults, interference in the internal politics of the United States, the promotion of strikes and sabotage by the agents of Count Bernstorff—has exposed him to hard and even bitter criticism from his countrymen. Perhaps he over-estimated the strength of the German-American and Pacificist elements. But his difficulties are great, and his long suffering diplomacy has at least this merit, that if America enters the War it will be as a united people. Germany's decision to resort to unrestricted submarine warfare on February 1 is the last straw: now even Mr. Henry Ford has offered to place his works at the disposal of the American authorities.

Day by day we read long lists of merchant vessels sunk by U-boats, and while the Admiralty's reticence on the progress of the anti-submarine campaign is legitimate and necessary, the withholding of statistics of new construction does not make for optimism. Victory will be ours, but not without effort. The great crisis of the War is not passed. That has been the burden of all the speeches at the opening of Parliament from the King's downward.

Lord Curzon, who declared that we were now approaching "the supreme and terrible climax of the War," has spoken of the late Duke of Norfolk as a man "diffident about powers which were in excess of the ordinary." Is not that true of the British race as a whole? Only now, under the stress of a long-drawn-out conflict, is it discovering the variety and strength of its latent forces. The tide is turning rapidly in Mesopotamia. General Maude, who never failed to inspire the men under his command on the Western front with a fine offensive spirit, has already justified his appointment by capturing Kut, and starting on a great drive towards Baghdad.



On the Salonika front, to quote from one of Mr. Punch's ever-increasing staff of correspondents, "all our prospects are pleasing and only Bulgar vile." On the Western front the British have taken Grandcourt, and our "Mudlarks," encamped on an ocean of ooze, preserve a miraculous equanimity in spite of the attention of rats and cockroaches and the vagaries of the transport mule.



At home the commandeering of hotels to house the new Ministries proceeds apace, and a request from an inquiring peer for a comprehensive return of all the buildings requisitioned and the staffs employed has been declined on the ground that to provide it would put too great a strain on officials engaged on work essential to winning the War.

The criticisms on the late Cabinet for its bloated size have certainly not led to any improvement in this respect, and one of the late Ministers has complained that the Administration has been further magnified until, if all its members, including under-secretaries, were present, they would fill not one but three Treasury Benches. Already this is a much congested district at question-time and the daily scene of a great push. Up to the present there are, however, only thirty-three actual Ministers of the Crown, and their salaries only amount to the trifle of L133,000. The setting up of a War Cabinet, "a body utterly unknown to the law," has excited the resentment of Mr. Swift MacNeill, whose reverence for the Constitution (save in so far as it applies to Ireland) knows no bounds; and Mr. Lynch has expressed the view that it would be a good idea if Ireland were specially represented at the Peace Conference, in order that her delegates might assert her right to self-government.

England, in February, 1917, seems to deserve the title of "the great Loan Land." Amateurs of anagrams have found satisfaction in the identity of "Bonar Law" with "War Loan B." As a cynic has remarked, "in the midst of life we are in debt." But the champions of national economy are not happy. The staff of the new Pensions Minister, it is announced, will be over two thousand. It is still hoped, however, that there may be a small surplus which can be devoted to the needs of disabled soldiers. Our great warriors are in danger of being swamped by our small but innumerable officials.



The older Universities, given over for two years to wounded soldiers and a handful of physically unfit or coloured undergraduates, are regaining a semblance of life by the housing of cadet battalions in some colleges. The Rhodes scholars have all joined up, and normal academic life is still in abeyance:

In Tom his Quad the Bloods no longer flourish; Balliol is bare of all but mild Hindoos; The stalwart oars that Isis used to nourish Are in the trenches giving Fritz the Blues, And many a stout D.D. Is digging trenches with the V.T.C.



It is true that Mr. Bernard Shaw has visited the front. No reason is assigned for this rash act, and too little has been made of the fact that he wore khaki just like an ordinary person. Amongst other signs of the times we note that women are to be licensed as taxi-drivers:

War has taught the truth that shines Through the poet's noble lines: "Common are to either sex Artifex and opifex."

A new danger is involved in the spread of the Army Signalling Alphabet. The names of Societies are threatened. The dignity of Degrees is menaced by a code which converts B.A. into Beer Ack. Initials are no longer sacred, and the great T.P. will become Toc Pip O'Connor, unless some Emma Pip introduces a Bill to prevent the sacrilege.