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[Illustration: _Customer._ "HAVE YOU MY PASS BOOK?"

Punch or the London Charivari, Volume 150, May 17 1916

_Overworked Cashier._ "DID YOU LEAVE IT WITH US?"

Punch or the London Charivari, Volume 150, May 17 1916

_Customer._ "I DON'T KNOW, BUT I THOUGHT YOU MIGHT AS WELL LOOK FOR IT BEFORE I DO."]

Punch or the London Charivari, Volume 150, May 17 1916

"We can never talk of the theatre without harking back to the play itself," says "The Matinée Girl" in _The Evening News_. Funny how these irrelevant trifles will obtrude themselves into the most facile critic's train of thought.

So simple and successful has been the progress of the Daylight-Saving Scheme, under which the clock is to be put forward an hour during the summer months, that a movement is on foot to help the War Office prophets by putting the War back a couple of years.

It is not generally known that during the week ending May 7th a fourth Zeppelin was sunk by H.M.S. Feuilleton.

A tremendous boom in canaries is reported from New York. The colour is believed to be a favourite one with the hyphenated.

Breconshire County Council is proposing to abolish Sunday fishing. It is felt, however, that the demands of the Sabbath will be met if the fishermen can be prevented from describing their exploits till Monday morning.

An evening contemporary has the following heading:--

Petrograd tale of a gloomy 'Papa' and an angry Below."

Can the Prussian idol have contracted so vulgar an ailment as a pain in his underneath?

Sabadilla, it appears, is a plant of the Lily family, from which is extracted a poison that forms the basis of the German "tear" shells. An allied form, "Crocodilla," also possessing lachrymatory properties, is likewise extensively used by the German Government.

*** It is observed that the Committee to investigate the administration and command of the Royal Flying Corps is composed of four lawyers and two engineers. The large proportion of "doers" to "talkers"--nearly half the total--is a startling innovation in British public affairs and a satisfactory sign that the Government is thoroughly awake to the gravity of the situation.

"Pawn-tickets are evidences of real poverty--when a man pawns his shirts and so on," said Judge CLUER recently at Whitechapel. "And so off" would have been a more logical way of putting it.