Chapter 2

Yet out here one cannot help noticing that the War was not waged entirely by the lovelier sex. And so I am writing to ask you to say a word or two about the work of the Brother Service, the less conspicuous branches of our army, the men who hauled big guns about, who stood in trenches, who looked after ammunition, or who killed mules to provide us with pressed beef. Little bits of the great machinery--hangers-on of the great Women's Army Corps--yes, but without the humble hairpin the whole coiffure falls to the ground.

I have never been a pessimist or a scaremonger, but _without some of these men I don't believe we women would have won the War at all!_

They ought to be encouraged, Mr. Punch. Could you not start a Muscle Competition for the men who helped the women win the War? Something like the Beauty Competitions for us other warriors? Why not offer prizes to the Tommy with the biggest biceps, the Subaltern with the thickest calf, and the Brigadier with the finest abdominal development?

One is so afraid that at the next European crisis the War Office, having learned its history from picture papers, will simply mobilise the women and forget all about the men. Those absurd machine guns with their wobbly legs really need a man's touch. Besides, it would be so jolly dull without them.

No, the men really helped, and we ought not to forget it.

I hope that in years to come, when little voices in the firelight (that's a pretty touch--who says the Army has made us unfeminine?) beseech me, "Tell us again how you won the War, Great-grandma," I shall retain sufficient perspective to reply, "Granny didn't do it all alone, darlings; there were a lot of men who helped too."

Yours faithfully,

ADMINISTRATOR Q.M.A.A.C.

* * * * *

From a description of our infantry's arrival in Cologne:--

"Then came more Fusiliers, the Lancashire Fusiliers and the Royal Dublin Fusiliers, and after them battalions from all parts of the British Isles.... It was wonderfully thrilling to go from one bridge to the other, from skirl of pipes to the triumphant swing of 'John Peel,' and then to the 'Maple Leaf For Ever.'"

_Times._

And what did the Dublins play? "Erin on the Rhine"?

* * * * *

* * * * *

* * * * *

THE WATCH DOGS.

LXXIX.

My dear Charles,--Old Bowdler has been brooding again on that idea of a brief for the defence in the forthcoming trial of the ex-Kaiser. He rather fancies himself cross-examining with courtesy but firmness some Generalissimo or other, or reducing to tears by an eloquent speech a court packed with everybody who is anybody, and in both cases having the eyes of Europe upon him and the ears of America hanging on his next word. After all, barristers will be barristers and, when they are, your ordinary man is no match for 'em. It took another man of his own kind to knock the conceit out of the idea.

Lack of precedent was no difficulty to Bowdler's learned opponent. A ready imagination made up. To hear him talk you would think he had spent his life assisting at the trials of ex-Kaisers. He described the whole affair as if it had already taken place. Thus:--

The culprit, he assumed, is on bail, though not, of course, on his own recognizances. First, attention is called to the case by Counsel for the Prosecution rising early in the sitting and asking his Lordship if he might mention the case of WILLIAM HOHENZOLLERN, next on his Lordship's list.

"William who?" asks the Clerk of Assize.

"WILLIAM HOHENZOLLERN," answers counsel: "H-O-H-E-N-Z-O-double L-E-R-N."

A titter is heard at the idea of a man going about with a name like that. His Lordship, regarding it as a nuisance rather than a joke, threatens to have the court cleared. A juryman in waiting in the gallery seizes the opportunity to ask, if anyone is to be turned out, might it be himself.

Counsel goes on to mention the case. "A complicated case of false pretences, my Lord----," he begins. But his solicitor plucks at his gown and points out to him that he is confusing his briefs. Counsel apologises to the Court and asks leave to refresh his memory. In a passionate whisper to his solicitor he asks who is this Hohenzollern man, anyway, and why the devil does he want to be mentioned before his time? Enlightened, he explains to the Court that the accused has got some money together for a dock defence and would like an opportunity to instruct his counsel more fully.

His Lordship refuses a postponement; Hohen-what's-his-name should have thought of this before. His Lordship has every confidence in counsel's ability to pick up the facts as the case proceeds. If counsel's personal convenience is involved that is another matter. But as for Zohenhollern--["Hohenzollern, my Lord"]--he cannot expect particular treatment; and that will do, thank you.

The ushers start calling out for him to surrender to his bail: "Hohenzollern! Hhhohenzollern! Owen Zollern!" re-echoes throughout the building. "Zollern--O-N!" is heard faintly in the far distance. No one notices that a gentleman with a fierce moustache has already made his dramatic entry and is trying to push his way into the dock....

He is stood up with half-a-dozen other prisoners, so that one jury may be sworn for the lot. It is desired that each prisoner should be identified with his name as it is called. WILLIAM HOHENZOLLERN, whichever he may be, is asked to bold up his hand. An old man in corduroys, who wears a dirty handkerchief round his neck for collar and cravat, and is charged with feloniously stealing, taking and carrying away his forty-first pair of boots and is also a bit 'ard of 'earing, insists that he is the man. As nothing will persuade him that he is not, the Clerk of Assize leaves it to the warders to decide which of the two is which. After all it is a small point.

The case is called on and WILLIAM is left in sole possession of the dock. This is his moment, thinks he. With set features he stands forward and assumes the most important attitude possible.

"Are you WILLIAM HOHENZOLLERN?" asks the Clerk of Assize.

There is a pause. "I am," says he.

Everyone turns to have a look at him. Feeling that he is thoroughly impressing everyone WILLIAM fixes a commanding eye on the judge, compelling, as he supposes, his utmost attention.

"Let's adjourn for lunch," says the judge....

When at last the case gets to its hearing (so far as anything at all can be heard over the small talk in front of the dock and the shuffle of impatient feet behind it) a novel point arises. A witness refers to the War. "What war?" asks his Lordship. Counsel thinks he can explain, but WILLIAM isn't for letting him. "Will you keep silence?" says the Judge to WILLIAM. "You must call evidence to prove that there was a war," he says to counsel.

WILLIAM faints upon realising that Armageddon, his masterpiece, was such that judicial knowledge wasn't aware of it....

Witness after witness is called; barrister after barrister, in the bar beneath the dock rail, goes to sleep. WILLIAM, after shaking off the stupor caused by the awful disregard of his personality, begins to murmur incoherently. The warder taps him on the shoulder. WILLIAM, who has never even conceived of being tapped by anybody, bursts out with an exclamation. The worst thing which has ever happened to him in his life then happens. Bowdler, Bowdler of all the un-imperial and un-godlike people in this world, turns to WILLIAM to rebuke him in a stern whisper, telling him that he is doing himself no good and concluding his remarks with "My man"....

The trial proceeds, WILLIAM being speechless with rage. In his ears is ringing a Hymn of Hate--hate of everybody in the court, but particularly of Bowdler. Every time he can get his brain to work and his tongue to work with it, he leans forward to breathe some drastic utterance at his defending counsel. Bowdler remains detached. WILLIAM (late Kaiser) has to realise as a cold fact that here is a wretched mortal daring to sharpen a pencil while he is being addressed by the ALL-HIGHEST. The ALL-HIGHEST reaches over the dock rail to thump the wretched mortal's wretched head....

Bowdler rises deliberately. There is a hush. He is going to say something important. WILLIAM feels that at last the world is sane and duly attentive to him again. Bowdler submits that the state of mind of the accused person (accused person!) should be inquired into.

The judge very readily acquiesces; anything to get rid of the fellow. The prison doctor swears that he has never seen a lunatic if this isn't one. An assertive juryman, who disapproves of business being so rushed as not to permit of a hanging, expresses the view aloud that it is all put on. Silence ensues upon the anomaly of a juryman daring to express a view aloud; WILLIAM avails himself of this silence for the same purpose. His view, which was evidently intended to take some time in the expressing, starts off with personal reminiscences of the intimate friendship and business partnership between himself and the Almighty. The juryman at once gives in and the verdict is found before WILLIAM has completed his second sentence....

WILLIAM hears himself being ordered "to be detained during His Majesty's pleasure." The warder, propelling him down below stairs to the cells, makes it quite clear to WILLIAM that the Majesty referred to is not his (WILLIAM'S)....

Bowdler follows later to tell WILLIAM what a lucky fellow he is, and also to take off him one pound, three shillings and sixpence....

Yours ever, HENRY.

* * * * *

* * * * *

A "POCKET" BOROUGH.

"Beyrout, the ancient Berytus, is 55 miles WNW from Damascus. The port is strongly fortified, its walls being three inches in circumference."--_East African Paper._

* * * * *

THE EUPHEMISTIC MOSLEM.

"DEATH OF TURKISH MINISTER.

"A Constantinople message reports that the Turkish Minister of the Interior has resigned."

_Australian Paper._

* * * * *

GUARANTEED.

"You recognize, of course, that the situation is exceptional," said Edith's mother. "You left New York on December 2, and arrived at Euston on December 13. To-day, December 18, you ask me for my daughter's hand, after a three days' acquaintance. Is this the usual American pace?"

"That is hardly my fault," I said. "We ran into a nasty bit of weather off Cape Race and lost twelve hours."

"Still," she said, "under the circumstances you will admit that I have the right to put a few questions. Edith is all I have. She has naturally not told me everything, but I gather you have spoken to her a good deal about yourself."

"Not more than three or four hours at a sitting," I replied.

"And you have never spoken to anyone else as you have to Edith?"

"I have."

"Oh," she said.

"I wish it had been otherwise," I pleaded; "but life is very complex nowadays on both sides of the Atlantic. Much that I have told Edith I have also revealed to the passport clerk at Washington and the keeper of birth records in New York. Something too I confided to the assistant-book-keeper in the War Zone Bureau at the Custom-House in New York, to the cashier of the French consulate at home, and to the gateman of Cunard Pier 54, at the foot of West Fourteenth Street. I am sorry; I wish Edith had been the first to whom I gave up the inner secrets of my soul, but the fact is that to some extent she was anticipated by your Military Control-Officer at Liverpool."

"It might have been worse," she sighed. "You have nice manners and a good face. At home I suppose you are quite popular?"

"Up to the twenty-fifth of October I shouldn't have said so," I replied. "But since then a great many people have taken to me. Not quite like DORIS KEANE, you know, but still I have distributed in a little more than a month no fewer than three dozen photographs of myself two and a-half inches square. Your consul at New York took two, the French Chamber of Commerce took three, and I am having some more ready for the time when I go to make application for my emergency ration card, in case your food department proves equally susceptible. I have been asked out a great deal. The State Department at Washington made me come down for several weekends and your Military Officer at home had me in on three successive days."

"Mr. Smith," she said, "you seem an honest man. Do you, in your heart, believe yourself good enough for my Edith?"

"Had you asked me that six weeks ago," I said, "I should have answered 'No.' Before I spoke to Edith, that very same question flashed up within me. I saw the golden sheen of her hair in the moonlight--for you do sometimes have moonlight here in London--and wondered whether I had the right to speak. Of course I was not good enough for her, but still I felt that I was not altogether unfit. I might justly ask for her in the face of high Heaven, the Passport Bureau at Washington, the War Zone Bureau at the Custom-House, the head clerk at the Cunard office, the watchman at the pier, the official who changed my American money into your own very confusing monetary system, the man at the head of the gang-plank, the man at the foot of the gang-plank, the steward who filled my alien's declaration, the steward who gave me my landing-card, several battalions of control officers, and approximately half the Allied diplomatic services. When I spoke to Edith I had all the documents in my breast-pocket, and my heart glowed with justifiable confidence beneath them. The dear girl never asked for my college certificate and my luggage check, but I have them all here."

"Perhaps it isn't necessary," she said. "You may have her, my dear boy."

"Without even looking at my Czecho-Slovak _visé_ my club dues for 1918, and my inoculation receipt for typhoid and paratyphoid A and B?" I stammered.

"You have a nice face," she said.

* * * * *

* * * * *

OUR GREAT UNKNOWN.

_First Official_. I say, who is the Head of the Thingumyjig Ministry--the one at the Hotel Giorgione?

_Second Official_. Haven't an idea. I thought it had been wound up.

_First Official_. Well, I'm not so sure of that. There was an announcement about it in the papers, and then an official _démenti_, and then the Minister resigned, and now I hear he has been reappointed.

_Second Official_. Then you evidently knew his name all along. Why on earth did you ask me?

_First Official_. You see, it's like this. I had a bet on with a man at the Club that out of ten Government officials not more than one would know the Minister's name. You didn't, and you happen to be the ninth who didn't, so I've won my bet. By the way, do you know what has become of the _chef_ at the Giorgione?

_Second Official_. You mean old Savary, who was always gassing about his descent from NAPOLEON'S General? I think he went back to Paris some time ago.

_First Official_. Thanks; then I win my second bet--that out of ten Government officials five would know _his_ name.

* * * * *

UNNATURAL HISTORY.

From a _feuilleton:_--

"She watched him catch the sticklebacks which were one day to turn into frogs."

_Church Family Newspaper_.

* * * * *

"The Crown Prince expressed hope he would one day be able to return to Germany and live there as a sample citizen."--_Bath Herald_.

We don't think quite so badly of the Germans as all that.

* * * * *

"To Property Owners and Hotel Proprietors.--Start Redecorating and Repairs now, before the rush comes, and gives the boys returning a chance for work."--_Provincial Paper_.

Personally, we shall postpone our order until the boys do come home.

* * * * *

* * * * *

A CONSPIRACY IN THE POULTRY-YARD.

DEAR MR. PUNCH,--I suppose it must be conceded that practical jokes have not the vogue that they once enjoyed. No longer do you discover some fine morning that the street in which you live is blockaded with furniture vans, all endeavouring to deliver furniture you don't require and never heard of before, while your staircase is a mass of flowers and fruit constantly increasing upon you and threatening to smother you with their amount no less than with their scent. It would gradually appear that the deliveries both of the flowers and the furniture were being executed in accordance with the orders of one of your friends, and that you had to grin and bear it as best you might. I cannot say that the victim or the general public, when they heard of it, looked upon it with any excess of enthusiasm. Anyhow, practical jokes have gone out.

Yet there is a kind of practical joke which, so far as I know, has never been played upon anybody, and which, if it wore played, might provoke a considerable volume of laughter and no small inconvenience. I have schemed it out and venture to submit the plan to you.

My idea is to take some weekly magazine which caters either for some special trade or amusement or pursuit. Let us imagine it to be _The Chicken Run_, with which is incorporated _The Fowls' Guardian_. I am entitled to assume that most of Mr. Punch's readers are acquainted with this bright and lively feathered journal. My plan is to get together some bold spirits, to capture the editor and his staff, and to hold them in a comfortable but rigorous imprisonment for one week; to take possession of the editorial office, and then to set to work to transform the contents of the paper. I foresee the amazement of the faithful readers of _The Chicken Run_, on being informed, in the column headed "Hints to Beginners," that Mr. LLOYD GEORGE'S pet Leghorn cockerel has developed a surprising taste for latchkeys, and recently swallowed two of them, while Mr. ASQUITH'S Buff Orpington pullet has taken to following him about like a dog and roosting on his bed-rail. Then there would be a breezy editorial article designed to prove that poultry had come out of the war with a much enhanced reputation, owing to the loyal part they had played in assisting the FOOD-CONTROLLER.

Further, there would be special articles proving, for instance, that champagne is the one drink on which all breeds of chickens increase and multiply their production of eggs, especially if hot caviare is afterwards administered in large bowls. Then there would be the first chapters of an enthralling serial whose plot revolved round the love-story of Sir Robert Wyandotte and Lady Cecilia Buttercup--a literary effort of unparalleled brilliancy due to the genius of a new novelist who preferred to be known as the Red Rover of Rhode Island. And so on and so on. If you think the scheme is feasible, let me hear from you and I will begin to get my team of villains together.

Yours faithfully,

THE GAME CHICK.

* * * * *

"Women and young persons now employed in these works enjoy a miximum working week of fifty-five and a half hours."--_Sunday Paper_.

And, we suppose, a manimum wage.

* * * * *

AT THE PLAY.

"THE BABES IN THE WOOD."

When I saw a dull red glow in the early evening sky above the great open flares that lit the portals of the Theatre Royal, I said to myself, "This brings the Peace home to one!" But those who think that England will never be the same after the War, that all things will become new and better, have not reckoned with the Drury Lane Pantomime. Its tactics may change, but its general strategy remains untouched by War or Peace. Under any name--_Ali Baba_ or _Aladdin_, _Puss in Boots_ or _The Babes in the Wood_--its savour is the same. If only a tenth part of the enterprise that goes to the making of its great pageants were devoted to the invention of a new subject, though it were only _The Babes in Boots_ or _Puss in the Wood_! However, with Bolshevism in the air it is best perhaps not to tamper with British institutions.

Still, even within the limits imposed by immemorial tradition there surely must be somebody in the United Kingdom who could make a better book. It was pathetic that so capable a cast--Miss LILY LONG in particular--should have such second-rate stuff to say and sing. Seldom could one detect any attempt to evade the obvious. Of topical allusions, apart from timeworn themes of coupons and profiteers, there was scarce a sign, and such burlesque as there was had no sort of subtlety in it. Take, for example, the opportunity lost in the imitation of a bedroom scene from modern drama. It announced itself as something "West-Endy," yet it was like nothing (I imagine) even in the remote Orient. And constantly the poor play of _esprit_ had to be carried off by the distracting thud of some falling body or covered by the deadening clash of the eternal cymbals.

It is significant, in this connection, that there never seems to be any male character in these pantomimes that is not committed to buffoonery. Apparently no reliance is placed on the unassisted humour of the dialogue. A funny remark must be clinched with a somersault, a repartee be driven home by a resounding smack on the face. You might have thought that on such an occasion there would be room for the figure of some gallant soldier of the masculine sex. Yet there wasn't a vestige of khaki in the whole show, and the only patriotic song assigned to a man's voice had to be delivered by the comic villain.

However, the actors were too good to be defeated by the authors; and the two couples--the _Babes_ (Mr. STANLEY LUPINO as _Horace_ and Mr. WILL EVANS as _Flossie_) and the _Robbers_ (Messrs. EGBERT)--went far by their personal drollery and unflagging spirits to make up for any defect in the words. Each member of the two pairs played very loyally into the other's hands. Mr. ALBERT EGBERT indeed played into his brother's feet with equal devotion; and the good humour with which he accepted the fiercest blows on face and person seemed to indicate an exceptionally close fraternal understanding.

Mr. HARRY CLAFF as the Wicked Uncle (with a note or two in the operatic manner) belied his villainous nature by an unusually amiable temperament; and Miss FLORENCE SMITHSON, with her dainty air, furnished interludes of conventional song, during which we gave our ribs a rest.