ion, down the back of Uncle's neck,
Till he fled to get an iceberg, which he providently found
Half on land and half in water, so he couldn't well be drowned.

Oh, his gait was very silent, very sinuous and slow--
He had learnt it from a waiter whom he met about Soho;
He was much the best tactician of the migratory band
And he earned a decent living as a parcel packed by hand.

"Sergeant James," we said, "how goes it?" but the Sergeant looked askance;
Not for him the mazy phalanx or the military dance;
He could only sit and suffer, with a most portentous frown,
While a crowd of little gipsies turned the whole thing upside down.

Aunt Maria next surprised us: for her massive back was grooved,
And her adenoids gave trouble, so we had them all removed;
If we hadn't done it neatly she'd have gone and joined the dead,
As it is she hops politely while she walks upon her head.

So we'll all fill up a cheque-form on some celebrated Banks--
It's a pity that a cheque-form should be made so much of blanks--
And we'll give the Bank of England all the credit that is due
To her hoards of gold and silver; and I wish they weren't so few.

* * * * *

"Mr. ---- has been actively connected with the last two Victory
Loan drives, in the last one raising $15,282,000. As an
appreciation of his work the salesmen presented him with a
(fifteen million dollar) diamond ring."--_Canadian Paper_.

We are glad that something was left for the Loan.

* * * * *

[Illustration: _Small Boy (who has been promised a visit to the Zoo
to-morrow)_. "I HOPE WE SHALL HAVE A BETTER DAY FOR IT THAN NOAH
HAD."]

* * * * *

OUR BOOKING-OFFICE.

_(By Mr. Punch's Staff of Learned Clerks.)_

I found myself as much taken with the title of _The Great
Interruption_ (HUTCHINSON) as with any of the dozen short war-stories
that Mr. W.B. MAXWELL has collected in the volume. Yet these are
admirable of their kind--"muffin-tales" is my own name for them, of
just the length to hold your attention for a solitary tea-hour and
each with some novelty of idea or distinction in treatment that makes
the next page worth turning. The central theme of all is, of course,
the same: the War in its effect upon people at the fighting front and
elsewhere. Perhaps it was inevitable that Mr. MAXWELL should betray a
certain faintly cynical