RTED AMERICAN ULTIMATUM.

BRITAIN MUST FIGHT.

OUR INFATUATED WAR OFFICE STILL
REFUSES TO LISTEN TO MR. BUTTERIDGE.

GREAT MONO-RAIL DISASTER AT
TIMBUCTOO.---------------------------------------

or this:-- --------------------------------------- WAR A QUESTION OF
HOURS.

NEW YORK CALM.

EXCITEMENT IN BERLIN.---------------------------------------

or again:-- --------------------------------------- WASHINGTON STILL
SILENT.

WHAT WILL PARIS DO?

THE PANIC ON THE BOURSE.

THE KING'S GARDEN PARTY TO THE MASKED TWAREGS.

MR. BUTTERIDGE TAKES AN OFFER.

LATEST BETTING FROM TEHERAN.---------------------------------------

or this:-- --------------------------------------- WILL AMERICA FIGHT?

ANTI-GERMAN RIOT IN BAGDAD.

THE MUNICIPAL SCANDALS AT DAMASCUS.

MR. BUTTERIDGE'S INVENTION FOR
AMERICA.---------------------------------------

Bert stared at these over the card of pump-clips in the pane in the
door with unseeing eyes. He wore a blackened flannel shirt, and the
jacketless ruins of the holiday suit of yesterday. The boarded-up shop
was dark and depressing beyond words, the few scandalous hiring machines
had never looked so hopelessly disreputable. He thought of their fellows
who were "out," and of the approaching disputations of the afternoon. He
thought of their new landlord, and of their old landlord, and of bills
and claims. Life presented itself for the first time as a hopeless fight
against fate....

"Grubb, o' man," he said, distilling the quintessence, "I'm fair sick of
this shop."

"So'm I," said Grubb.

"I'm out of conceit with it. I don't seem to care ever to speak to a
customer again."

"There's that trailer," said Grubb, after a pause.

"Blow the trailer!" said Bert. "Anyhow, I didn't leave a deposit on it.
I didn't do that. Still--"

He turned round on his friend. "Look 'ere," he said, "we aren't gettin'
on here. We been losing money hand over fist. We got things tied up in
fifty knots."

"What can we do?" said Grubb.

"Clear out. Sell what we can for what it will fetch, and quit. See?
It's no good 'anging on to a losing concern. No sort of good. Jest
foolishness."

"That's all right," said Grubb--"that's all right; but it ain't your
capital been sunk in it."

"No need for us to sink after our capital," said Bert, ignoring the
point.

"I'm not going to be held responsible for that trailer, anyhow. That
ain't my affair."