respondent of the
Food Production Department. Those who recall the impetuous abandon of
the pre-war agriculturist may well ask whether Boloism has not been
work at again.

***

Railway fares in Germany have been doubled; but it is doubtful if
this transparent artifice will prevent the KAISER from going about
the place making speeches to his troops on all the fronts.

***

It is announced that promotion in the U.S. services will be based
solely on fitness, without regard to seniority. These are the sort of
revolutionists who would cover up grave defects in army organisation
by the meretricious expedient of winning the War.

***

Inquiries, says _The Pall Mall Gazette_, disclose a wide-spread habit
among customers of bribing the assistants in grocery shops. The custom
among profiteers of giving them their cast-off motor cars probably
acted as the thin end of the wedge.

***

A dear old lady writes that she is no longer nervous about air-raids,
now that her neighbourhood has been provided with an anticraft airgun.

* * * * *

[Illustration: THE AIR-RAID SEASON.

THE RESULT OF A LITTLE UNASSUMING ADVERTISEMENT: "CELLARMAN
WANTED.--APPLY, 82, ---- STREET, W."]

* * * * *

FOOD ECONOMY IN IRELAND.

"Gloves, stockings, boots and shoes betoken the energy and meal
of the day, something tasty is desirable, and a very economical
dish of this kind can be made by making..."--_Belfast Evening
Telegraph._

* * * * *

ZEPP-FLIGHTING IN THE HAUTES ALPES.

_TO J.M._

Recall, dear John, a certain day
Back in the times of long ago--
A stuffy old estaminet
Under the great peaks fledged with snow;
The Spring that set our hearts rejoicing
As up the serried mountains' bar
We climbed our tortuous way Rolls-Roycing
From Gap to Col Bayard.

Little we dreamed, though that high air
Quickens imagination's flight,
What monstrous bird and very rare
Would in these parts some day alight;
How, like a roc of Arab fable,
A Zepp _en route_ from London town,
Trying to find its German stable,
Would here come blundering down.

The swallows--you remember? yes?--
Northward, just then, were heading straight;
No hint they dropped by which to guess
That other fowl's erratic fate;
An inner sense supplied their vision;
Not