il-bags stolen, while to one class of mind it may
argue that the present is a most inopportune moment for a great
constitutional change, may to another suggest that only such a change
will give any hope of improvement.

It is, at any rate, something to know that Irishmen have not in trying
circumstances entirely lost their saving grace of humour. Thus the
writer of a letter to Lord ASKWITH, describing with much detail a raid
for arms, in the course of which his house had been smashed up and he
himself threatened with instant death, wound up by saying, "I thought
I would jot down these particulars to amuse you."

The Commons had a rather depressing speech from Mr. MCCURDY. His
policy had been gradually to remove all food-controls and leave prices
to find their own proper (and, it was hoped, lower) level. But in most
cases the result had been disastrous, and the Government had decided
that control must continue. Sir F. BANBURY complained of the conflict
of jurisdiction between the Departments. It certainly does seem unfair
that the FOOD-CONTROLLER should be blamed because the Board of Trade
is "making mutton high."

* * * * *

[Illustration: THE PROFITEER'S CIGAR.

_Spokesman of Club Deputation._ "WE TRUST, SIR, THAT YOU ARE NOT
DELIBERATELY WEARING THAT BAND ON YOUR CIGAR, AS IT IS THE DESIRE OF
YOUR FELLOW-MEMBERS THAT YOU SHOULD OBLIGE THEM BY REMOVING IT."]

* * * * *

WANTED--A BOOK SUBSIDY.

Mr. JOHN MURRAY, the famous publisher, has recently given a
representative of _The Pall Mall Gazette_ some interesting facts and
figures bearing on the impending crisis in the publishing trade. It
is a gloomy recital. Men doing less work per hour with the present
forty-eight hour week than with the old fifty-one hour week, and
agitating for a further reduction of hours; paper rising in price by
leaps and bounds. "Between the two they are forcing up the price of
books to a point when we can only produce at a loss." In other
words, we are threatened with not merely a shortage but an absolute
deprivation of all new books. The horror of the situation is
almost unthinkable, but it must be faced. We can dispense with many
luxuries--encyclopaedias and histories and scientific treatises and so
forth--but among the necessities of modern life the novel stands only
third to the cinema and the jazz. It is possible that in time the
first-named may reconcile us to bookles