"'Bird-scarer,'" said the C.S.M. "I know there's a heading for that
somewhere. Agricultural, ain't it? 'Bird-scarer.' Ah, here we are.
'Group 1.' You'll be one of the first for release."

The Company Clerk noted the fact, and the C.S.M. called "Next man."

Randle Janvers Binderbeck stepped forward.

"What's your job, Binderbeck?" said the C.S.M.

(To ask Lord NORTHCLIFFE, "Do you sell newspapers?" To ask BOSWELL,
"Have you heard of a man named JOHNSON?" TO ask HENRY VIII, "Were you
ever married?")

The futility of the question flabbergasted Randle.

"Come on, man," said the C.S.M.

Randle made an effort. "Journalist," he said.

"'Journalist,'" said the C.S.M., "'Journalist.' Yes, I thought so.
'Group 41.' You've got a long way to go, my lad. You'd have done
better if you was a bird-scarer, like Hodge. Them's the boys the
nation wants--Group 1 boys. You sticks in the Army for another six
months' fatigue. Next man."

That was all.

John Hodge is now soberly awaiting demobilisation, and will not have
to wait long.

Randle Janvers Binderbeck is secretly consoling himself by writing the
most denunciatory articles. They will never be published, but they
afford an alternative to cocaine.

He feels that he can never again consent to sway public opinion as the
west wind, etc., in the interests of a nation which rates him forty
groups lower than an animated scarecrow.

It is the nation's own fault, Randle is blameless.

* * * * *

A NOISY SALUTE.

From a review of _The Remembered Kiss_, in _The Westminster
Gazette_:--

"It would be doing Miss Ayres an injustice to suppose that
there is only one kiss to remember in the whole of her novel,
but the one which gives its title is bestowed by a young and
handsome burglar, and received by a girl who mistook the noise
he was making for a thunders torm."

As TENNYSON says in _The Day-Dream_: "O love, thy kiss would wake the
dead!"

* * * * *

[Illustration: _Father (bringing son home from party)_. "WELL, OLD
CHAP, WERE THERE PLENTY OF LITTLE GIRLS FOR YOU TO DANCE WITH?"

_Son (rather proud of himself)_. "OH, THERE WERE SOME KIDS ABOUT, BUT
_I_ DANCED WITH A GIRL OF SIXTEEN--AND, BY JOVE, SHE LOOKED IT."]

* * * * *

FREAKS OF FOOD-CONTROL.

Though Mrs. Midas shows a righteous zeal
In preaching self-control at every meal,
She never in