hoop and jubilate and jazz;
And while our flappers beat the floor
There's Russia soaked in seas of gore,
And LENIN waxing beastly fat;
Nobody seems to think of that.

O.S.

* * * * *

PERFECTLY UNAUTHENTIC ANECDOTES.

_which may be reproduced (with the permission of Mr. Punch) in any
forthcoming volume of Anybody's Reminiscences_.

"You do things so sketchily and casually," said FRITH to WHISTLER one
day. "Now when I paint a picture I take pains. 'The Derby Day' cost me
weeks and months of sleeplessness. I did nothing else; I gave my whole
mind to it." "Oh," said WHISTLER, "that's where it's gone to, is it?"

* * * * *

When Mr. BERNARD SHAW made his tour of the ports in order to
popularise Socialism in the Navy, he was courteously received at
Portsmouth by Sir HEDWORTH MEUX. The talk happened to turn on the
theatre, and the Admiral was candid enough to confess himself somewhat
at sea with regard to the merits of contemporary writers. "Now, Mr.
SHAW," he said in his breezy way, "I wish you would tell me who is the
most eminent of the playwrights of to-day?" "Ay, ay, Sir," said Mr.
SHAW promptly.

* * * * *

Dr. Brotherton told me that he was once with MATTHEW ARNOLD in an
election crowd at Oxford, when the Professor of Poetry accidentally
collided with a working-man flown with Radicalism and beer. "Go to
blazes!" said the proletarian. "My friend," replied ARNOLD, "we are
well met. In me you see the official representative of Literature,
whereas you, I perceive, stand for Dogma."

* * * * *

Mrs. Brown of Newquay, who claims to be the original _Mrs.
Partington_, told me that SYDNEY SMITH'S last years were overclouded
by his inability to discover the riddle to which the answer is
contained in the words, "The one rode a horse and the other rode a
dendron."

* * * * *

Probably few people remember a Nottinghamshire poet of an earlier
day who fulfilled with much conscientiousness the duties of local
laureate. It was the age of Notts's pre-eminence in cricket, and that,
with other reasons, inspired the bard to write some verses which
opened with the line, "Is there a county to compare with Notts?" The
county of Derby was jealous of its neighbour in other things besides
sport, and considered itself to have scored when its own tame m