RE."

_Officer_. "SURE YOU HAVE NO PREFERENCE?"

_Pitman_. "WELL, PUT ME IN ONE O' THEM THAT SPIKES THE BEGGARS."]

* * * * *

THE NEW ANAESTHETIC.

REMARKABLE DISCOVERY.
MEDICAL SCIENCE SUPERSEDED.

A correspondent in whose accuracy we place the highest trust informs
us of very remarkable results which have been achieved by the adoption
of a new means of alleviating pain and suffering invented by a lady in
London. This lady being suddenly taken with lumbago was in great agony
until she remembered our soldiers at the front, and thought how much
worse was a wound, and instantly, our correspondent is informed, some
of her own distress left her. The case has been investigated by
several eminent inquirers and they are satisfied with her story.

Meanwhile evidence of a similar nature comes from other parts of the
country, in every case recording a sense of personal well-being,
though only comparative, and an increased disinclination to complain,
upon the realisation of what it must be to be a soldier just
now--whether up to his knees in a flooded trench, or sleeping on the
wet ground, or lying in agony waiting to be picked up and taken to a
hospital, or being taken to a hospital over jolting roads, or going
without meals, or having to boil tea over a candle-flame, or awakening
from the operation and finding himself maimed for life.

Nor is the lenitive of this little effort of imagination confined to
bodily ills; for a well-authenticated case reaches us of a notoriously
mean man of wealth who was not heard to utter a single word of
grumbling over the new war taxes after realising what the soldier's
burden was too. Hence _Mr. Punch_ is only too happy to give publicity
to the discovery.

* * * * *

The Spy Danger.

Extract from a letter written by an East Coast resident:--

"The authorities are now looking for a grey motor-car, driven
by a woman, who is thought to have a wireless apparatus
inside."

R.A.M.C. forward, please.

* * * * *

[Illustration: _The Sentimentalist (who has received socks from
England)_. "SHE LOVES ME; SHE LOVES ME NOT."]

* * * * *

THE LAST BOTTLE.

I had been drilling all the morning, and had spent the whole of the
afternoon squirming face downwards on the moist turf of Richmond Park
in an endeavour to advance, as commanded, in extended or