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PUNCH,

OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI.

VOL. 150.

APRIL 19, 1916.


[Illustration: _Overworked and exasperated Colonel (who has told Adjutant
to answer the telephone)._ "WELL, WHAT THE BLAZES DO THEY WANT?"

_Adjutant._ "IT'S THE C.O. OF THE BLANKSHIRES, SIR; WANTS YOU TO REPEAT
THE FUNNY STORY YOU TOLD HIM LAST NIGHT AT MESS."]

       *       *       *       *       *




CHARIVARIA.


The recent Zeppelin raids have not been without their advantages. In a
spirit of emulation an ambitious hen at Acton has laid an egg weighing
5-1/4 oz.

       * * *

The opponents of Colonel ROOSEVELT regard the advice given in the title
of his new book, _Fear God and take your own part_, to be unusually
moderate as coming from one who, whatever he may have said to the contrary,
is very generally suspected of being prepared to take the part that is
at present being played by President WILSON.

       * * *

At a meeting of the "No-Conscription Fellowship" last week, Mr. PHILIP
SNOWDEN referred to the Conscientious Objectors as the "Salt of the
Earth." Perhaps, but we don't care to have them rubbed into us.

       * * *

Germany has addressed a Note to the United States explaining that the
_Sussex_ could not possibly have been torpedoed for the reason that the
submarine commander who sank the vessel had no difficulty in drawing
a picture of her which closely resembled a totally different ship.

       * * *

It is announced that the care of the great vine at Hampton Court has been
taken over by the Office of Works from the Board of Green Cloth. It is
rumoured that the latter body, which has been of late somewhat lost sight
of, is to be entrusted with the general supervision of our aerial forces.

       * * *

So successful have been the electrically-heated footwarmers supplied
to the police of Pittsburg, Pa, that the State Department is said to
be contemplating their adoption.

       * * *

For shouting "The Zepps are coming!" a Grimsby girl has been fined
L1. It was urged in defence that the girl suffered from hallucinations,
one of which was that she was a daily newspaper proprietor.

       * * *

While announcing in Parliament last week that the Zoo would have to
pay the Amusement Tax the CHANCELLOR promised to "keep an open mind in
regard to any representations that might be made on the subject." Mr.
MCKENNA, we understand, has since received a strong representation from
the hippopotamus, protesting that, while he and his fellow-pachyderms are
commonly considered as instructive, their natural dignity precludes them
from attempting to provide amusement in any form.

       * * *

"In twenty years' time," says Mr. PEMBERTON BILLING, "the aeroplane will
bring about universal peace." This statement will come as a distinct shock
to many who imagined that with Mr. BILLING at Westminster it might be
expected to achieve this desirable result in about twenty days.

       * * *

The Gaslight and Coke Co., in the interests of economy, are proposing
to abandon the painting of street lamp-posts. The chief patrons of
these institutions, they say, will be quite satisfied as long as the
lamp-posts still feel the same to the touch.

       * * *

A woman doctor has lately advanced the theory that talking leads to long
life; but an attested married man of our acquaintance assures us that
this is a mistake, and that it merely makes it seem longer.

       *       *       *       *       *

    "BURY MARRIED MEN AND LORD DERBY."

                                                    _Provincial Paper._

A tempting solution of the Government's problem, but perhaps a little
too mediaeval for these times.

       *       *       *       *       *




METHODS OF A GERMAN MISSIONARY.

[See note to Cartoon on opposite page.]

_The Sultan soliloquises:--_


  MEHMOUD, the gilt is off your idol's crown;
    Clear shows the clay beneath the chipped enamel;
  In sporting phrase, your dibs have been planked down
        On the wrong camel.

  This WILLIAM had a God he called his peer,
    And yet must needs take on a new religion;
  Spoke well of ALLAH; in His Shadow's ear
        Cooed like a pigeon;

  Pressed you to join him in a Holy War;
    Advanced the wherewithal you badly needed;
  And taught you how to go for Christian gore
        The same as he did.

  And now, where Afric's fountains fling their balm,
    In his last place within the sun, 'tis written
  With how remote a love for dear Islam
       Your Bosch was bitten.

  He hoped to stamp your creed out, branch and root;
    This missionary meant to take your Arabs
  And crush their souls beneath his mailed boot
        Like crawling scarabs.

  And if they still ignored his ponderous heel,
    If still their faith in ALLAH stood unshaken,
  He looked to stimulate a local zeal
        For heathen bacon!

  MEHMOUD, it is too much! Sick Man you are,
    Yet in your veins I hope enough of vigour is
  To tell this WILLIAM he has gone too far
        With his damned piggeries!

                                                                  O. S.


       *       *       *       *       *




UNWRITTEN LETTERS TO THE KAISER.

No. XXXVII.

(_From Dr. LIEBKNECHT._)


If such trifling matters as the meeting of the Reichstag now occupy any
portion of your Majesty's attention, it may please you to learn that my
membership of that august body has been temporarily suspended. At the
same time I should be sorry that your Majesty should labour under any
misapprehension as to what happened. No doubt I was forbidden to speak,
though I am the representative of people whose voices have a right to be
heard even in the unhappy Parliament which is all that the German Empire
is allowed to provide for the subjects of the German KAISER. But I wish
you to understand that I was not silenced before I had said aloud nearly
everything that I had in my mind to say. It is true that I did not make
any formal speech. The bellowing blockheads who now arrogate to themselves
the name of patriots and all the virtues of patriotism were easily able
to prevent me from doing this, and I was forced, therefore, to confine
myself to short and sharp interjections thrown in at appropriate moments
while BETHMANN-HOLLWEG, that arch-impostor, was proving to the whole world
that even if Germany had a good case he is the last man who would be able
to place it in a convincing manner before the judgment of the world.

Your Majesty has had a long practice in the use of words. You pride
yourself on the glorious and beneficial effect of such speeches as that
in which you condescendingly praised the Almighty for having allied
Himself with you, very much, as it appeared, to His own advantage,
or that other speech in which you announced to your conscripts their
duty to shoot down their parents if in some momentary whim you ordered
them to do it, or even that other brave and Imperial harangue in which
you declared your humane and merciful designs on the Chinese people. I
have no doubt, then, that if you could be induced to speak your opinion
fairly and openly you would admit that, though you yourself could, of
course, have done better, I did not do so very badly in my little bout
with poor BETHMANN. At any rate I spoke the truth, which is an inconvenient
course of conduct, and made BETHMANN look the fool that everybody (except,
perhaps, your Majesty) knows him to be.

Indeed, your Majesty, a fool who is also arrogant is a very terrible
thing. When BETHMANN, for instance, spoke of Germany's love for her
neighbours, and in particular for the small nations, he delivered himself
into my hands. All I had to do--and I did it--was to remind him that he
proved his love by jumping upon them and strangling them. In a moment
the whole fabric of his stupid argument was shattered and he was left
gaping open-mouthed and without an answer before the whole world. The
incident showed the man's mind and his disposition in a lightning flash,
and from all countries, even from wretched Belgium and from ruined Serbia,
there came a laugh of hatred and contempt. Why are we so hated? Not
because we are great and powerful and prosperous, but because we make our
greatness an incubus, our power a tyranny and our prosperity an offence.

Fools like BETHMANN do not see this. They and their fellow-fools, some
of them quite brilliant men, with high notions on literature and music and
the drama, are for ever in a state of jealous fear. They have the mania
of persecution and imagine that all other countries are leagued against
them for the purpose of wiping Germany off the map. Then they lose their
unfortunate heads and strike out blindly to right and left. The other
nations have no course open to them except to defend themselves as best
they may, and then Herr BETHMANN and his superior fools shout out that
this wicked defensive proves up to the hilt that when they spoke of
conspiracies they were fully justified and that Germany for her own safety
must smash and in the end control every other country under the sun.

And yet, your Majesty, the time will come when we must have peace. This
pouring out of blood, this tremendous waste of money and lives must some
day have an end. Those are the best patriots who would put a stop to it
as soon as possible, for the longer you defer peace the more difficult
it becomes to make it. We have been told of great victories, but they
profit us not at all. All is desolation and cruelty and confusion. And
those who think most of Germany know best how bitterly she needs peace.

Your truth-telling but suspended subject,

                                                            LIEBKNECHT.

       *       *       *       *       *


    "THE LIAR'S PUNISHMENT.

    "_The Matin_ points out the predicament in which the German High
    Command must have found itself yesterday when editing its daily
    _communique_. No doubt it wished to place on record with all
    customary exaggeration the slight advantage gained on the <DW72>s
    of the Dead Man. But how can the German High Command state this
    convincingly when for over a week it has solemnly announced the
    complete capture of the Dead Man? It has therefore to maintain
    silence as the only expedient."--_Evening News_.

On the principle: "_De mortuis nil nisi bonum_."

       *       *       *       *       *


    "We are told that the maximum of the income-tax duty will be
    reached at five shillings in the pound, a figure that will recall
    the Budgets of the Neapolitan wars."--_Irish Paper._


When, as now, Vesuvians were so heavily taxed.

       *       *       *       *       *


[Illustration: LOVE ME, LOVE MY PIG. [Captured documents show that the
German Government had schemed to stamp out Mohammedanism in East Africa
both by force and by the encouragement of pig-breeding.]]




GRASS VALLEY ARMISTICE.


"'E didn't mean to do it," he said, touching the bandages on his head.
"Oh no, quite an accident. It was a foo-de-joy--doorin' the armistice.
Wot, haven't you 'eard of Grass Valley Armistice?"

I said I couldn't recall it for the moment.

"It was doorin' September," he said; lasted two hours. Sergeant Duffin
started it.

"'E was out on a patrol one night, and suddenly 'e comes rashin' back
over the parapet and goes chargin' down to the Major's dug-out with a
face like this 'ere sheet.

"'They'me comin',' ses Bints 'oo was next to me, and we were just goin'
to loose off a round or two, when we 'eard ole Duffy