Various

“ Connoisseurs of literature, always eager for a new frisson, will be fascinated to learn that this novel has for its subject a fellow-novelist of whose retired existence she has but lately become aware. ”

“ Balfour was to introduce the Naval Estimates, and his dear friend and ex-colleague, Colonel Winston Churchill, was announced to follow him. The conjunction of these highly-electrified bodies is always apt to produce sparks. The House was well filled, and over the clock could be seen Lord Fisher, like "a sweet little cherub that sits up aloft to keep watch for the life of poor Jacky." The last time Mr. Churchill spoke of Naval affairs in the House he was not quite nice to Lord Fisher. ”

“ On the contrary, it is because they are realized as understandable creations of flesh and blood that the disasters of Norah and Tom Spain and the tragedy of Letty Summerbee's enforced spinsterhood move one to so personal a concern. From the moment when Norah and Tom enter their little house after the short honeymoon to that in which the tormented young wife finally leaves her worthless husband for the protection (word rightly used) of his long-suffering friend one is made to feel that exactly thus and thus the affair happened, and is happening to like persons every day. ”

“ To his skill as a soldier Colonel Churchill adds no small ability as a writer, and has published more than one book that has attracted favourable notice.
Following upon his remarkable speech of the other night, there has been some discussion as to whether Colonel Churchill will definitely take up a political career, or return to the trenches. We have it on good authority that an old friend, Sir Hedworth Meux, strongly advises him not to sacrifice his military prospects. ”

“ But it was an amazing proposition that the Government should be asked to dismiss Sir Henry Jackson, an officer who was everything that Lord Fisher according to Colonel Churchill was not. He himself would not yield an inch to such a demand.
Spontaneous debate has never been the Colonel's strong point. ”

“ Robert Halifax without a feeling of pleasant anticipation, nor close one without a sense of quickened sympathy for my fellow-mortals, especially those of them who dwell in Camden Town. His latest story, The Right to Love (Methuen) , finds him again on familiar ground; but the inhabitants of Widdiford Street have all the freshness of real human beings. Perhaps more than its predecessors The Right to Love is a story with a purpose and a moral; in it Mr. Halifax has illustrated by two groups of characters the vexed question of marriage failures and the hard lot of the unwanted woman. ”

“ If Miss Dell, who seems to have a penchant for tempestuous heroes, would devote some of her superfluous energy to a study of men, so as to get to understand them as well as she understands her own sex, it would be a good thing for the quality both of her work and of her public. ”

“ The kings of the earth have many priceless possessions; they are able to confer upon each other various glittering orders of merit and distinction; but we doubt if any one of them has a dearer possession or a more genuine order of merit than this simple prayer of faith and gratitude offered at sunrise and at sunset on behalf of Your Majesty by the bedside of a little English child. ”

“ But for the moment we had somehow run clean out of bratting-slats.
So we had to return the poor fellow with a request that all experts should be completed with bratting-slats before being sent to the front line. This request only produced the senseless interrogation, "What is a bratting-slat?" to which we have not yet bothered to reply. In the meantime if we are really sitting on a mine it seems quite a tame one. It hasn't as much as barked yet.
Just in our bit we aren't very well off for dug-outs; it isn't really what you'd call a representative sector from any point of view. ”

“ Then Colonel Churchill proceeded to put the cap on. He has been studying the problems of sea-power in the trenches of Flanders, and the process has led him to gloomy conclusions. Suppose the Germans have been building more ships than we have: suppose they have put into them bigger guns than we wot of; suppose they were to come out at their selected moment and found us at our average moment.... The House was beginning to be a little weary of these depressing hypotheses when it was suddenly brought up all standing by the discovery that the orator was delivering a eulogy on Lord Fisher. ”

“ Dixmude was not quite such a big affair as Verdun, but the men who held the town, "the young ladies with the red pompoms" on their caps, were first cousins to our own Jack Tars. Bretons or Britons, there is nothing to choose between them. Sailors all, they are the salt of the sea; and this fascinating and circumstantial epic of the French marines is not at all an exaggerated picture of the cheery courage and endurance of the Breton fisherman.
Sussex Gorse (Nisbet) is a story about the fight between man and nature. ”

“ Yet, without an effort on her part, her tissues in one minute produced enough heat to boil one twenty-fourth of a pint of water.
"Wonderful!" he whispered hoarsely, probably thinking of this, "you are wonderful."
You will not marvel that his voice was gruff when I tell you that the membrane of the larynx was inflamed. Greater men than Charles have become hoarse in such circumstances. ”

“ Examples of the Little Navy and Voluntary System fetishes are now rather rare, but you should have no difficulty in securing a well-preserved specimen of the Free Trade fetish at the old emporium of antiquities kept by the firm of John Simon and Co.
"A Single Man."—When you say that you are forty years old, that you have practically built up a business which will be ruined if you leave it, that you are the sole support of a stepmother and a family of young half-brothers and sisters, but that you have felt it your duty to attest without appealing for exemption, we applaud your patriotism. ”

“ Perhaps one might object that Mr. Halifax brings an indictment against society without suggesting any practical remedy. Also that—as I have noticed before—his humorous characters have a tendency to edge away from the rest into the regions of farce. But for all that The Right to Love remains a simple, sincere and very moving study.
I like the remark that General Joffre made, not to the horse-marines, but to the remnants of the six thousand Fusiliers Marins who made up the Naval Brigade at Dixmude in November, 1914. "You are my best infantrymen," he told them ”

“ The warrant officer, who had been pretending to resume Freckles, presently looked up and suggested that he could go in his uniform to a tailor, explain the position and obtain clothes on credit.
The originator of the problem thought hard for a minute.
"'E isn't a man as I'd care to trust myself," he said rather unexpectedly, "an' I don't think no one else would neither." ”

“ A Chertsey pig-breeder has been granted total exemption. The pen, it seems, is still mightier than the sword.
Some slight irritation has been caused by the announcement of Sir Alfred Keogh that Naval men engaged on the home service cannot be supplied with false teeth at the expense of the Government. Nevertheless we may rest assured that, come what may, these gallant fellows will uphold the traditions of the Navy and stick to their gums. ”

“ No foundation is required for walls erected by the plan of stooting, but a damp-course of mulpin is advisable, and it is always best to pingle the door-jambs, and binge up the rafters with a crumping-block. ”

“ Colonel Churchill's sensational tour de force has aroused a natural interest in his personality. He is still a young man, being only just on the wrong side of forty. In choosing a military career he responded to hereditary impulse, for he is a direct descendant of that great military genius, the Duke of Marlborough. ”

“ I put my 'aversack down when we was diggin' one of our chaps out of a Jack Johnson 'ole, and some bloomin' blighter pinched it! Now that's a thing as I don't 'old with. Rotten, I call it. I wouldn't say nothing about it, mind you, if I was dead; I like to 'ave something as belonged to a comrade, myself, an' I know as 'e'd feel the same, seein' as 'e couldn't want it 'imself. But, if you take a feller's things w'en 'e's alive, why, you don't know 'ow bad 'e might want 'em some day. ”

“ Chief of Village Fire Brigade. "We're all ready. Is steam up?"
Engineer (temporary) . "If you want steam in this engine you'll have to get Thompson 'ome from France to show me 'ow to light the bloomin' fire." ”

“ In palæontological circles the report that the monster's death was occasioned by the consumption of too much seed-cake is regarded as going far to prove that our neolithic ancestors were not without their sentimental side. ”

“ That was Lord Beresford's view, too; we must oppose Zeps to Zeps. Then, having evidently done some violent thinking over the recent debate in the Commons he launched out into a wholly irrelevant attack upon Colonel Churchill for trying to create anxiety about the Fleet, and appealed to Lord Fisher (who was not present though Lord Beresford had particularly invited him) to repudiate the agitation conducted by the honourable Member for Dundee, a few newspapers and twenty sandwichmen. ”

“ Oh, my dear, don't reproach me for not having run round. We are simply off our heads. Bogloffsky—the Bogloffsky—is coming to dinner on Friday next, and the Mudder and I have been simply tearing. Even the Sticklers have accepted, and we hope to get Sir Henry Say, as the Dudder met him once at a City dinner. Of course I shall have to play something first. Pity me!....
VI.
From Mrs. Sleight-Spender to Messrs. Rosewood and Sons. March. 3rd.
Mrs. Sleight-Spender requires the use of a very good piano on the 10th. It must be a grand, as it is for Mr. Bogloffsky. ”

“ Sleight-Spender presents her compliments to Mrs. Crichton and would be obliged if she would prevent what is evidently a schoolroom piano being practised late at night, as it is most disturbing when one has friends. ”

“ If you had covered your heart!!"
"Charles!!!"
Householder (with the Zeppelin obsession) .
"Ah, I Like the Snow. It Reduces The Menace From Above."
!!!!!!
"Yesterday between Forges and Bethincourt, west of the Meuse, the enemy made use of suffocating gas, but did not attack with infancy."—Timaru Herald (N.Z.) .
We are glad to have this evidence that the Huns have given up using children to screen their advances.
"Plagues of rates have appeared at Pinsk, and in the British trenches."
Buenos Ayres Herald.
Even at home we have not entirely escaped the epidemic. ”

“ That's wot I ast you. If 'e walks about naked, well, 'e gets took up for bein' naked; if 'e doesn't, why, 'e gets 'ad for not returnin' 'is uniform."
He looked round again and decided to take the rest of us into consultation.
"This 'ere's 'ow it stands—see? 'Ere's a feller got the mitten along o' not bein' able to march, through gettin' shot in the leg. 'E goes 'ome pendin' 'is discharge, an' o' course e' walks about in 'is uniform. Then 'e gets 'is discharge, an' they tells 'im to return 'is kar-kee an' small kit——"
"An' small kit?" ”

“ The warrant officer sighed and opined that orders were orders.
"Yes, but 'e 'd 'ave to carry 'em to the Post Office naked, wouldn't 'e? An' 'ow about goin' to buy new ones? That's if 'e 'd drawed 'is pay, which 'e 'asn't. Unreasonable, that's wot I calls it."
"'Asn't 'e got no civvies at all?" said the small man, beginning to look sceptical. "'Asn't 'e got no one as 'd lend 'im a soot? Anyways, 'e could get some one to post 'em for 'im, an' then stop in bed till 'is others come."
"'E's a very lonely feller," said the champion of the unclad; "'e lives in lodgin's, an 'e 'asn't got no friends. ”