lse hopes.

(4) With many or all Departments in one building there would be the
temptation to place the entire clerical staff under Mr. Neville Chamberlain
as Director-General, who would transfer them from one office to another
according to the necessities of each day's work. Such mobility would be
unpopular, while the inevitable creation of a central Press-Bureau,
Publicity and Information Department would afford the Press a satisfaction
that it has done nothing to deserve.

(5) On the top floor of a sky-scraper is usually a luncheon-club; here the
various Ministers would meet daily, and could only with difficulty escape
the exchange of ideas.

(6) If all Government offices were in a single building the PRIME MINISTER
could make daily visits to each, and would find it hard to avoid comparison
between the organization and methods of his various Ministers.

These considerations alone finally dispose of any merits which the plan for
a national sky-scraper may seem superficially to possess.

* * * * *

ANSWERS TO CORRESPONDENTS.

"SCRUTATOR TEMPORIS ACTI."--You are not the only one who holds that
Parliament could not be better or more patriotically occupied at the
present stage of the War than in devoting their energies to a discussion of
the Report of the Dardanelles Commission and the detailed evidence on which
it was based. We understand that your view is shared by all the keenest
patriots among the Central Powers.

"TUBER CAIN."--The earliest poet to sing of rationing was WILLIAM MORRIS,
who repeatedly described himself as "The idle singer of an empty day."

"A LOVER OF 'BUSTER BROWN.'"--We gladly gave publicity to your indignant
denial of any tribal relationship between "Buster Brown" and Filibuster
STONE.

* * * * *

"Miss Adela Pankhurst attempted to-day at the Midland Junction, a
strong Labour centre, to deliver a lecture directed against Mr. Lloyd
George and Mr. Hughes.

The audience sang her down with 'Rule Britannia' and 'Australia 5s. a
box."--_Pall Mall Gazette_.

The latter song, no doubt, alluding to the entrance-fee charged by the
famous Boxing Kangaroo.

* * * * *

[Illustration: CENTRAL ISOLATION.

GERMAN KAISER. "YOU'RE ABOUT THE ONLY ONE LEFT FOR ME TO TALK TO."

KING OF SPAIN. "AND I'M NOT FEELING VERY CHATTY."

[It is reported that communication between Berlin and Amer