Chapter I: Front Matter

PUNCH,

OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI.

VOLUME 147.

DECEMBER 23, 1914.

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CHARIVARIA.

An exceptionally well-informed Berlin newspaper has discovered that, owing to the war, Ireland is suffering from a horse famine, and many of the natives are now to be seen driving cattle.

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An appeal is being made in Germany for cat-skins for the troops. In their Navy, on the other hand, they often get the cat itself.

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In offering congratulations to the "Green Howards" on the work they have been doing at the Front, Major-General CAPPER said, "I knew it was a regiment I could hang my hat on at any time of the day or night." The expression is perhaps a little unfortunate; it sounds as if they had been pegging out.

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Private F. NAILOR, of the Royal Berkshires, was at his home at Sandhurst last week when the postman brought a letter from the War Office reporting that he had been killed in action. While his being alive is, of course, in these circumstances an act of gross insubordination, the Army Council will, we understand, content itself with an intimation that it must not happen again.

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A cigar presented by the KAISER to Lord LONSDALE has been sold at Henley in aid of the local Red Cross Hospital, and has become the property of a butcher at the price of £14 10s. Will it, we wonder, now be inscribed, "From a brother butcher"?

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According to the _Berliner Tageblatt_ Western Australia is interning her alien enemies on "Rottnest Island." If there is anything in a name, this does seem a rather unhappy choice, in view of the well-known sensitiveness of the German.

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It is curious how in war time really important occurrences are apt to escape one's notice. For example, it was not until we read an article in a contemporary last week on "The Demise of the Slim Skirt" that we realised that Fat Skirts were now the vogue.

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Of all forms of cruelty the most hideous is that which is perpetrated on defenceless little children, and we hear with regret that the Register of Births in Liverpool now includes the following names:--Kitchener Ernest Pickles, Jellicoe Jardine, French Donaldson, and Joffre Venmore.

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With reference to our recent remarks about Mr. J. WARD'S so-called mixed metaphor of a horse bolting with money, a gentlemen writes to us from Epsom to say that he has personally put money on more than one horse which bolted.

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The War would certainly seem to have led to better feeling in the Labour world between masters and men, and from a recent paragraph in _The Daily Mail_ we learn that there is now a London Association of Master Decorators. The idea is a pretty one. Iron Crosses, perhaps?

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The War has worked other wonders. Not the least of these, a Stock Exchange friend points out, is that lots of Bulls and Bears are now comrades in arms.

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"NEW PHASE IN RUSSIA. GERMANS CHANGING THEIR DISPOSITIONS."

_Daily Mail._

We are glad to hear this, for they used to have simply beastly ones.

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Illustration:

_Orderly._ "YOUR MAJESTY, I HAVE BEEN SENT TO ASK FOR DETAILED INSTRUCTIONS ABOUT THE CHRISTMAS DINNER TO BE HELD AT BUCKINGHAM PAL----"

_Wilhelm_.----! ----!!

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Another secret revealed by Mr. HAMILTON FYFE:--

"As usual when they take the initiative, the Russian troops swept
the enemy before them. They first cleared out the trenches and then
pursued the Germans."--_Daily Mail._

In the West we still cling to the old-fashioned method of first clearing out the Germans and then pursuing the trenches.

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SOME LITERARY WAR-NOTES.

MESSRS. HARRAP have just brought out _William the Silent_. This is not a biography of the KAISER.

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Nor is _The Hound of Heaven_, a new edition of which is announced by Messrs. CHATTO AND WINDUS.

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Mr. EDWARD CRESSY'S _Discoveries and Inventions of the Twentieth Century_ makes no mention, curiously enough, of the WOLFF Bureau. We look in vain, too, among the Yuletide publications for a book of Fairy Tales by WILLIAM HOHENZOLLERN. This does not speak well for the alertness of our publishers.

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Messrs. JACK, we see, have produced a _Life of Nelson_. It is now, we consider, up to Messrs. NELSON to produce a volume with some such title as _We All Love Jack_.

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At last the Germans are reported to have scored a little success in the United States. An American coon is said to have been so much impressed by the achievements of the Germans that he has sent a song to the KAISER, the opening words of which are "My Hunny!"

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The War is responsible for a splendid boom in the study of geography. An English lady who visited some of the Belgian wounded at a certain London hospital the other day asked one of them where he was hit, and on receiving the reply, "_Au pied_," is said to have spent hours trying to find the place on the map.

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Which reminds us that, owing to the new names which the various belligerents are giving to towns which they have conquered (like Lemberg) or temporarily occupied (like Ostend), several map-makers are reported to be suffering from nervous breakdown.

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The Kaiser's Thanks.

"The Archbishop of York and Germany."

_Heading in "Edinburgh Evening Despatch."_

Other pluralists, like the Bishop of SODOR AND MAN, are not at all jealous, nor are we at all surprised.

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"They drank the full-flavoured soup with scarcely a sound."--_The
Story-Teller._

Another example of true British refinement.

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THE OLD SEA-ROVER SPEAKS.

[Referring to our victory off the Falkland Islands, the _Tägliche
Rundschau_ remarks: "On board our North Sea ships our sailors will
clench their teeth and all hearts will burn with the feeling,
'England the enemy! Up and at the enemy!'" The gallant bombardment
of defenceless towns on our East Coast would appear to be the
immediate outcome of this intelligent attitude.]

Behind your lock-gates stowed away,
Out of the great tides' ebb and flow,
How could you guess, this many a day,
Who was your leading naval foe?
But now you learn, a little late--
So loud the rumours from the sea grow--
England's the thing you have to hate,
And not (for instance) Montenegro.

The facts are just as you've been told;
Further disguise would be but vain;
We have a _penchant_ from of old
For being masters on the main;
It is a custom which we caught
From certain sea-kings who begat us,
And that is why we like the thought
That you propose to "up and at" us.

Come where you will--the seas are wide;
And choose your Day--they're all alike;
You'll find us ready where we ride
In calm or storm and wait to strike;
But--if of shame your shameless Huns
Can yet retrieve some casual traces--
Please fight our men and ships and guns,
Not women-folk and watering-places.

O. S.

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UNWRITTEN LETTERS TO THE KAISER.

No. XI.

(_From the GERMAN CROWN PRINCE_.)

MOST INTERNALLY (_INNIGST_) BELOVED FATHER,--Here in my headquarters we learnt with sorrow that you have been suffering from a bronchial catarrh. Anxious as we were at first, our minds were relieved when we heard that you had behaved very violently to those about you, for in that we recognised our good old father as we knew him from long since, and we said to ourselves that you could not fail soon to be in the saddle again with all your accustomed energy. And now comes the report that you are indeed yourself again, like _Richard III_, in our great German, SHAKSPEARE.

Now that all danger is past I cannot forbear giving you from my heart a word of warning, begging you not with rashness to risk your so valuable life. Do not laugh and imagine that I am pulling your leg (_dass ich Dir das Bein ziehe_). Nothing is further from my thoughts; I am quite serious. You must remember that you are not so young as you were and that this rushing to and fro between France and Poland, which to a man of my age would be a mere trifle, bringing with it only enjoyment, must be for a man who is between fifty and sixty a task well calculated to search out and expose his corporeally weak points so as to bring satisfaction, not to us, but to the enemy. Such a burden must no longer be placed only upon your back, for there are others whose bones are young and who are willing to share it with you. Why should we be compelled to sit still or merely to beat our back with fists while you, dear Father, undergo these too terrible fatigues? I myself, for instance, if I may say so with the most humble respect, am ready to represent you in all departments whenever you call upon me. I can scatter any number of Iron Crosses, and am willing to make speeches which will prove to our hated enemies, as well as to America and Italy, that God is the good old friend of our HOHENZOLLERN family and that He will pay no attention (why should He?) to anything that the English, the French, the Russians, the Servians and the Belgians may say. Is it not lucky for the Austrians and the Turks that they are on our side and can share in the high protection that we enjoy? To save you trouble I would even go so far as to open a session of the _Reichstag_, though for my own part I never could see much use in that absurd institution. Still we have it now under our thumb (_unter unserem Daumen_), and even the Socialists are ready to feed out of our hands and to allow us to kick them about the floor. He who says that war is barbarous and useless can learn by this example that it is not so. If you wish me to invite one or two Socialists (not more) to a State dinner I will even go so far as that. You see how deeply prepared I am to oblige you. And if you want to finish your cure by taking a complete rest from the serious work of being Commander-in-Chief, even in that point I am not unwilling to sacrifice myself to the highest interests of the Fatherland by replacing your august person both in the field and in the council chamber. You have only to say the word and I shall be there.

May I now add a few words about the War? Somehow it does not seem that we are getting on as we have been led to expect. Mind, I am not blaming anybody, certainly not your most gracious fatherly Majesty, but I must say that all the books which we were told to read showed us quite a different war, a war laid out on the system of 1870. At this stage, in 1870, everything was over except the siege of Paris and the shouting, but now we do not appear to be making progress anywhere. Why do these degenerate races hold back our holy and with-love-of-Fatherland-inspired troops? Perhaps the new MOLTKE has not been quite so sure in his touch or so triumphant in his plans as the old one--but then that ought not to have made much difference, because you and I have been there to keep him straight. FALKENHAYN, no doubt, might have been expected to do better, for you had opened your whole mind to him, but he too seems only able to knock his head against a stone wall (_seinen Kopf gegen eine Mauer stossen_) and the result is that we are everywhere getting it in the neck (_dass wir es überall in dem Hals kriegen_), and that process is not pleasant for a true Hohenzollern. It is possible that RUPERT OF BAVARIA has been allowed to talk too much. One CROWN PRINCE is enough even for a German army. Have you any idea what we ought to do to secure victory somewhere?

I am sending you a box of lozenges, which I have always found excellent for a cough. I beg also that you will not forget how efficacious is flannel when worn next to the skin.

Your most devoted Son,
WILHELM, KRONPRINZ.

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SEASONABLE GIFTS.