a Duke's claim for exemption?

Many a man possesses an undiscovered knack of extempore rhyming, a gift
which has seldom or never been exercised in the House of Commons. That
will be a bright day for legislators when a Member rises in his place
and begins something like this: "Sir, if the House will bear with me one
moment, I should like to say that I, for one, cannot agree that we have
found the perfect way of dealing with a gross neglect to which all
honest men object." Any Member who could keep up that sort of thing for
half-an-hour (and some, no doubt, could, if they would only practise)
would achieve lasting fame, not only for his originality, but because of
the remarkable scenes amid which his concluding lines would almost
certainly be uttered.

* * * * *

"The Germans planned to expel the British from South Africa,
aided by disinfected Boers."

_Englishman (Calcutta)_,

But, in the end, it was General BOTHA who cleared out the Germs.

* * * * *

[Illustration: _Mabel_ (_after Sunday tea, on departure of officers
quartered in the neighbourhood_). "I'm glad Captain Devereux didn't
come, as I'm not looking my oldest to-day."]

* * * * *

MY DUG-OUT.

(A Memory of Gallipoli)

It was my home, not ringed with roses blowing,
Nor set in meadows where cool waters croon;
Parched wastes were round it, and no shade was going,
Nor breath of violets nor song-birds' tune;
Only at times from the adjacent dwelling
Came down with Boreas the quaint, compelling
Scent of the Tenth Platoon.

And there not hermit-like alone I brooded,
But ant and lizard and all things that crawl
With great grasshoppers by brigades intruded;
Therein the tortoise had his homely stall;
Green flies and blue slept nightly in their notches,
Save when a serpent, in the middle watches,
Came and disturbed us all.

There, where the sun, the senseless sun, kept pouring,
And dust-clouds smothered one about the chest,
While secret waters filtered through the flooring
(In case the heat should leave one _too_ oppressed),
Always I lay in those sad fevered seasons
Which Red-Hat humourists, for mystic reasons,
Regarded as our "rest."

For it was home; and when I was not in it,
But in the trenches, it was home indeed;
When mad foes fired at twenty rounds a min