nly 830 persons. This
violent departure from the recognised Parliamentary rule, that a Minister
who cannot find use for a couple of thousand employees should resign, has
gone far to undermine the popularity of this Department.

***

Owing to the shortage of corn on which race-horses must be fed, ordinary
handicaps will soon have to be abandoned. The idea of putting the
horseradish to the use for which it was originally intended does not seem
to have struck the imagination of trainers.

***

The Director of Women's Service has issued an appeal for several thousand
milkmaids. These must not be confused with milksops who are being taken
care of by other Departments.

***

"I have heard more bad music at temperance meetings," says Dr. SALEEBY,
"than I knew the world could contain." The temperance people are certainly
having persistent bad luck.

***

The keenest minds in Germany, says a Berlin correspondent, are now seeking
to discover the secret of the Fatherland's world-wide unpopularity. It is
this absurd sensitiveness on the part of our cultured opponent that is
causing some of her best friends in this country to lose hope.

***

A swallow has been seen over the Hollow Ponds at Epping Forest, but _The
Daily Mail_ is still silent as to whether Spring has arrived or not.

***

"New Laid Eggs," Sir JOHN MILLAIS' masterpiece, has recently been sold for
L1,155. It is reported that last December, when it looked as if the egg
might become extinct, a much higher price was offered for the picture.

***

In the absence of other grain, hens are to be fed upon frostbitten wheat
imported from Canada. Poultry-keepers anticipate that it will result in a
greatly increased number of china eggs being laid by their stock.

***

A correspondent of a morning paper complains that while the entire nation
is on rations our Germans, naturalised and unnaturalised, "continue to eat
in the usual way." This is not true of the ones we have heard.

***

In view of the excessive rains of late, we are glad to note that one
organisation is not to be caught napping. The National Lifeboat Institution
is fitting out its boats with a new life-belt.

***

The KAISER, it is reported, has written a play. It only needed this to
convince us that he is quite himself again.

***

We also learn that he is once more on speaking terms with Count REVENTLOW.
He t