Various

“ The task she had undertaken was a prodigious one, for the sisters she had to rear were, you must understand, vexed with sex instincts of the type of the modern novel, and so in a large measure she failed, even though she sacrificed strength, happiness and even her own love-story in the effort to keep them straight. The tale is set out with every circumstance of sordid misery, in which the spiritual beauty of the heroine is meant to shine, and undeniably does shine with real strength and purity. ”

“ The end comes rather less wretchedly than could have been expected, but even so surely this is genius partly run to seed. The greatest tragedies are not written in these minor keys. Beat, woman and heroine, is so admirable that one fain would know her apart from all this unredeemed welter of sex and selfishness. ”

“ Think of the kindly interest which prompted the O. i/c Records to insert a form of receipt—"to guard against impersonation." My character might have got into base hands; some unworthy person might have gone about professing to possess that willingness, that industry, that sobriety, that trustworthiness and that elegance of conduct which are mine alone; but the form of receipt would baffle him. I cannot explain how, but Records knows. ”

“ Henry is in the War Office, where he takes a hand in the Direction of Military Aeronautics. To meet him you might almost think that Military Aeronautics was a one-man show. He has, at any rate in the eyes of the layman, an encyclopædic knowledge of aircraft and all appertaining thereto. When he is out for a walk on Sunday with his wife and daughter, and a British aeroplane passes over them with the usual fascinating roar, Henry is very superior. Mummy (who is of coarse clay) and Betty (aged 11⁄2, and coarser still) are frankly excited every time. ”

“ There is no Court, and nobody is sentenced, though the eminent specialist of Harley Street who essays the rôle of villain richly deserves to be. However, as he is left a bankrupt, discredited in his practice and detached from the heroine whom he had sworn to appropriate, it would perhaps be straining a point to cavil at his remaining at large. ”

“ The Winter season has begun exceptionally early. Last Sunday at Church Parade I saw Lady "Nibs" Tattenham, looking the very image of her latest photograph in The Prattler, where she appears with her pet Pekie over the legend, "Deeply interested in War-work."
A gallant Contemptible has been complaining to me that the Press shows no sense of proportion in the space that it allots to air-raids. Our casualties from that source, he said, are never one tenth as heavy as those in France on days when G.H.Q. reports "Everything quiet on the Western Front." ”

“ A Grimsby lady who has just celebrated her hundredth birthday states that she has never visited a cinema theatre. We felt sure there must be an explanation somewhere.
It seems a pity that the Willesden Health Committee should have troubled to pass a resolution about the decreasing birth-rate. When we remember air-raids and the shortage of sugar it is only natural that people should show a disinclination to be born just now. ”

“ When the B.M. got back he found a one-sided war in progress on the telephone. The G.O.C. had heated up the wires to red-heat.
"Is that you, Nessel? Where the devil have you been? This noise is still going on. Tell me what it is. No-dam-nonsense-now. Let's have it."
"If you want to know and you don't mind the Bosch hearing what I say, Sir, the dump, the French dump, has b-blown itself to b-blazes."
"Why the devil couldn't you say so before?"
Every dog has his day. With a full and fatuous smile the Brigade-Major picked up a paper and began: "Reference your G. 245/348/24 of the 29th inst. ”

“ Neville Chamberlain says, 'It is essential there should be provided amusements and recreations which can take people for an hour or so out of themselves and return them to their work refreshed and reinvigorated.'"
[pg 232]
SOCIETY NOTES. By The Hanger-on. AIR-RAIDS AND OTHER DIVERSIONS.
A promising young poet of my acquaintance, who in the midst of war's obsessions still finds time and taste for the exercise of his art (he is in a Government office) , has allowed me to see the opening couplet of what I understand to be a very ambitious poem. ”

“ Fortunately such cases of loitering on the part of our postmen are extremely rare.
An infuriated bull has been killed in High Street, Tonbridge, after wrecking several shop windows. It is thought that the animal had misread the directions on its sugar card.
A number of people have complained that they could hear nothing of the recent air-raids over London, owing to the noise of the firing being drowned by the admonitory activities of the police. ”

“ The human life of our great actors and actresses as revealed in some simple rustic villeggiatura has always had a fascination for a public that does not enjoy the privilege of their private friendship. ”

“ You're a disgrace to the Army. You're a ..."
"If you've quite finished with my squad, Major," put in Sister in a quiet voice from the door, "the car is here, and we're late already. I shall have to push a bit."
I promptly made for the seat beside the driver, explaining that I wanted to see the speedometer burst. Sister does a good many things, and does most of them well; but her particular accomplishment is her motor-driving. After my experiences in different cars at the Front—especially those driven by Frenchmen—I thought at first that motoring had no new thrills to offer me ”

“ In Berlin a crowd of people attempted to do some injury to an officer on the paltry excuse that he ordered the execution of thirty people for alleged espionage. The German people have always been a little jealous of the privileges of the military. ”

“ Life in a convalescent hospital for officers is not one continuous round of gaiety, but it has its incidents for all that.
The other day Sister took Haynes, Ansell and myself to have tea with some people in the neighbouring village of Little Budford. We were waiting in the hall for the car when Seymour came along. Seymour is an adjutant when he is not at home, and he likes to see things done with proper military precision. ”

“ Situated in a commanding position, underlooking the Heath, this hotel is positively the deepest in London. The Management has decided to extend the accommodation during one week in each month by offering beds on the steps of the staircase. No one has ever been known to walk either up or down this staircase, and patrons are therefore assured of an uninterrupted night's repose. ”

“ Only really robust men should refuse to tip the taxi-driver. Many a City man has set out in the morning intent on giving no tips and has not been heard of afterwards.
To enable timid men to avoid a tip, the police are providing taxi-drivers with antiseptic mouthpieces, through which their words may be sterilised. ”

“ Suffice that we are introduced to some quite charming people, as well as two extremely unpleasant ones, and if the web of mystery is held together in places by a somewhat generous share of obtuseness on the part of the persons concerned it is not for us to complain, since we become aware of the defect only after the affair is over. ”

“ A good deal of dissatisfaction is expressed with the state of the cellars to which people have been invited during the raids. "Surely," writes one of our correspondents, "it is a scandal that, at this time in the world's history, some cellars should be totally destitute of wine. That there should be no coal in the coal-cellars is understandable enough; but to ask the timid public into empty wine cellars is a travesty of hospitality."
Every effort will be made when the House reassembles to provide separate cellars for the SPEAKER and Mr. PEMBERTON BILLING. ”

“ An Englishman's home is still his castle, though the debased morals and decayed manners of modern Society (?) seem to blind its members to the fact.
I wish to give publicity in your pages to a disgraceful outrage of which I have been made the victim. On Tuesday last I was rudely awakened from my afternoon rest by the sound of a large motor-car. As I did not expect visitors I proceeded to the window in order to discover to what the intrusion might be due. ”

“ The raids are threatening to ruin the matinées now so prevalent by setting up counter attractions. The thousands of people (not only errand-boys) who now stand all day to watch the workmen mend a hole in the roadway caused by a bomb would otherwise, but for this engrossing and never tedious spectacle, be in this theatre or that. ”

“ All lines converge to this Hotel, which is therefore the most central in London. Frequent trains convey visitors direct to their beds. For the convenience of patrons arriving above ground or by District, the Directors have installed a superb moving staircase, thereby obviating the inconvenience of crowded lifts. ”

“ From a German communiqué:—
"On the eastern bank of the Mouse desperate fishing continues."—Edinburgh Evening Paper.
And the Bosch has caught more than he bargained for.
From the report of the meeting, in London, of the Executive Committee of the National Farmers' Union:—
"Farmers had hundreds of acres of grass which they were willing to turn into meat, but were prevented from doing so."
Mr. Punch thinks that the difficulty might be overcome if the meat were turned into the grass. ”

“ On the whole we favoured "Warrior," but perhaps we were wrong. At all events, the interpretation of "P" was clearly set forth by another document, which explained that I was entitled to a pension of eight shillings and threepence per week so long as I remained among the happy W.P.'s. There was also an identity certificate, whereon some clergyman, magistrate or policeman must attest that I was alive when I brought it to him, and a form of receipt for all the papers in the batch. ”

“ The Division rang up. One need hardly have mentioned that. In times of stress the higher formations rarely fail.
"What's going on?" they asked.
The Brigade Major was just going to say, when suddenly he remembered. That very morning he had been severely strafed for speaking of important things over the telephone when so near the enemy. "Had he not read the Divisional G 245/348/24 of the 29th inst.? What was the good of issuing orders to defeat the efficiency of the Bosch listening apparatus if they were not obeyed?" etc., etc. ”

“ WELLS' irreverences to mind that sort of thing; and I must say that, for a man who can't have had very much to do with the episcopacy in his busy life, he does manage to give a confoundedly plausible atmosphere to the whole setting. ”

“ LOCKE'S idea to present a very ordinary decent sort with the common man's prejudices and frank distrust of subtleties. A sinister mystery of love, death and blackmail runs, a turbid undercurrent, through the story. ”

“ But oh, my dears, just think of it, just think what luck for me
That she should come to Oxford Street and I be there to see!
R.F.
Light on the Situation.
"Dr. Michaelis is the trusted no-hold-out until their plans of annexation have been carried out, and they always receive a gracious telegram in reply. So he who cares to hear knows what the hour is striking."—Egyptian Mail.
Journalistic Humility.
"Two years ago The Daily Mail begged our sluggish authorities to study the question of daylight air-raids as well as night attacks. We pointed out their risk ”