ous periodical. It is
understood at Berlin that the Emperor's wrath has been excited by some
jocular allusions to his Majesty's oratorical indiscretions which
recently appeared in _Punch_." If the members of the Imperial Family
scrupulously obeyed the alleged command, they lost the enjoyment of a
hearty laugh over _Punch's_ retort--for it is _Punch's_ habit always to
retort in matters of this sort when his fun is misunderstood or his
irony, in his opinion, taken in ill-part. This was the much-talked-of
"Wilful Wilhelm"--representing the Emperor, _a la_ Struuwelpeter, as a
passionate fractious child, screaming amid his toy soldiers and drums:

"Take the nasty _Punch_ away;
I won't have any _Punch_ to-day."

Nor would he leave him alone for a while; but returning a year later to
the charge, and taking as a text the Emperor's words--

"It was impossible for me to anticipate the rejection of the Army
Bills, so fully did I rely upon the patriotism of the Imperial Diet
to accept them unreservedly. A patriotic minority has been unable
to prevail against the majority.... I was compelled to resort to a
dissolution, and I look forward to the acceptance of the Bills by
the new Reichstag. Should this expectation be again disappointed, I
am determined to use every means in my power to achieve my
purpose...."

_Punch_ promptly produced his cartoon a third time, by Mr. Sambourne's
pencil, of "Nana would not give me a bow-wow!--A Pretty Little Song
for Pettish Little Emperors," as the latest Teutonic version of the
music-hall ditty then in vogue. And later on there was Sir John
Tenniel's contribution to the pretty little quarrel, in which in
"Alexander and Diogenes" (October, 1893) the Emperor asks, "Is there
anything I can do for you? Castle? or anything of that sort?" and
Bismarck Diogenes grunts his reply, "No--only leave me to my tub!" But
the Emperor's anger did not last long--if it ever existed at all--for it
was announced that he again received his _Punch_ regularly, but, to
save appearances, it arrived from London every week in an
official-looking envelope, which was opened by the Kaiser's own hands,
and by him duly stowed away in his library.

If _Punch_, by his outspoken criticism, has succeeded in raising the ire
of two of the most civilised of the Great Powers, it was not to be
expected that he should escape the blacking-roller of the Russian censor
of the press. The touchin