information. Woolman is generally to be found leaving my rooms
at about 6.30 in the evening, and a smart detective could easily nab him
as he steps out.

A. A. M.

* * * * *

FORTUNE'S FAVOURITE.

Dear maiden of the sunny head
And cheeks of coral hue,
The lips of rarest ruby red,
The eyes of Oxford blue,
And other charms I've left unsaid ...
Ah, how I envy you!

Heedless of half a world at war
You neither strive nor cry;
Though danger knocks at England's door
There's laughter in your sky:
You ask not what she's fighting for,
Nor reck the reason why.

You little guess, you never will,
The force that nerves this fist
To toil away for you until
My mind is like a mist;
The lack of money for the mill,
The growing dearth of grist.

Ah, since amid a world grown wild,
And horrors still half told,
Peace has her palace round you piled,
By all the gods I hold
You are a very lucky child,
My little Nine-months-old.

* * * * *

Illustration: _Officer Commanding Squad (about to cross Waterloo
Bridge.)_ "'ALT! BREAK STEP! LARGE COLUMNS OF TROOPS WHEN CROSSIN'
BRIDGES IS COMMANDED TO 'BREAK STEP' SO THAT THE UNISON OF THEIR TREAD
MAY NOT DANGEROUSLY THREATEN THE STERBILITY OF THE BRIDGE."

* * * * *

A CANDIDATE FOR THE FORCE.

"I want to enrol myself as a Special Constable," I said to the man in
mufti behind the desk.

"Well, don't let me stop you," he remarked. "The Police Station is next
door. This is a steam laundry."

A minute later I began again:--

"I want to enrol myself as a Steam Laund--that is to say, as a Special
Constable."

"Certainly, Sir," said the Inspector in charge. "Your name and address?"

I opened my cigarette-case and placed a card on the desk.

"The name of the house is pronounced _Song Soocee_," I said, "not, as
spelt, Sans Souci."

The Inspector handed me back the card. It was a cigarette-picture
representing the proper method of bandaging a displaced knee-cap. I
rectified the error, and he entered the information in a book.

"I must ask if you are a British subject?" he inquired.

"You might almost describe me as super-British," I replied. "There is a
tradition in my family that my ancestors were on Hastings Pier when the
Conqueror arrived."

"Thank you. Tha