should be free to decline service if he chooses (as
he does), we cannot but disapprove of your irreverent and almost immoral
attitude towards the holy condition of matrimony. If the tie of wedlock
is not to take precedence of every other tie, including that of country,
where are we?

"A CRY FROM MACEDONIA."--In answer to your question as to when we think
it likely that the KAISER will take advantage of his recently-conferred
commission in the Bulgarian Army and lead his regiment against Salonika,
we are unable to fix a date for this movement. Our private information
is that he is detained elsewhere by a previous engagement which is
taking up more time than was anticipated.

"BULGAR."--We sympathise with you in your natural desire to have your
TSAR FERDINAND home again, and we share your sanguine belief that the
tonic air of Sofia (never more bracing than at the present moment) ought
speedily to cure him of his malignant catarrh. His Austrian physicians
however advise him to remain away, and he himself holds the view,
coloured a little by superstition, that his return should be at least
postponed till after the Ides of March, a day that was fatal to the
health of an earlier Caesar.

"YOUNG TURK."--Your anxiety about ENVER PASHA is groundless. The news
that he has been recently seen at the PROPHET'S Tomb at Medina conveyed
no indication that the object of his visit was to select a neighbouring
site for his own burial. Indeed, our information is that since his
recent assassination (as reported from Athens) he has been going on
quite as well as could be expected.

O. S.

* * * * *

BUILDING WITHOUT TEARS.

The enthralling correspondence in the columns of our contemporary, _The
Spectator_, on the subject of cheap cottages and how to build them, has
evoked a vast amount of correspondence addressed directly to us. We
select a few specimens which are recommended by their practical and
businesslike character:--

The Merits of "Posh."

DEAR SIR,--The question of Land Settlement after the War resolves itself
in the last resort into the employment of cheaper methods of cottage
building. Will you allow me to put in a word for the revival, in the
neighbourhood of the sea, of the old Suffolk plan of building with what
is locally known as "posh," after the name of the original inventor, who
was an ancestor of FITZGERALD'S friend. "Posh" is a mixture of old
boots--of which a practically unlimit