Sad is the sight, but not so strange, When the dead leaf to earth declines: I have observed this annual change As one of Autumn's surest signs; But oh, how very odd it is To mark the falling prices of commodities. One had supposed the boom of War (Still raging with the desperate Turk), Whose closure seemed past praying for, Would carry on its hideous work And swell for years and years The bulging waistcoats of our profiteers. But lo! a lot of useful wares Within my modest range have come; Trousers, I hear, are sold (in pairs) At three-fifteen--a paltry sum; And you can even get Dittos as low as thirteen pounds the set. I can afford a further lump Of sugar in my cocoa--yes, And cocoa too is on the slump, Its "second grade" now costs me less; And green peas (marrowfat) Are down to fourpence. I can run to that. And, though my coffers, sadly thinned, May not command a home-killed ham, And though the fees for pilchards (tinned) And eggs (to eat) and strawberry-jam Are still beyond my means (The same remark applies to butter-beans); Yet milk (condensed) and salmon ("pink"), And arrowroot and pines (preserved)-- All "easier," I am glad to think-- These, and a soul not yet unnerved, Shall keep me going strong, Now that the price of boots is not so long. O. S. * * * * * GONE AWAY! It seems to me that our local Hunt wants waking up. In some places, I believe, there are still people who "cheerily rouse the slumbering morn" by hunting the fox or the fox-cub, and, if one cannot let slumbering morns lie, there is no jollier way of rousing them. But in our village we hunt the 8.52. Morning after morning, if you watch from a high place, you can see our bowlers and squash hats just above the hedgerows bobbing down to the covert side. That one bobbing last is me. As we trudge homeward under the star-lit skies all our racy anecdotes are of the fine fast runs we have had with the 8.52, the brave swinging of the tail carriage, the heavy work over the points, the check and find again at East Croydon main.... Those who arrive early at the meet in the morning (but, as I have hinted, I am not one of these) stroll about the platform, I am told, talking of the rare old times when the 8.52 used to be the 8.51, pulling out their watches every now and then and saying to the station-master, "She's twenty-five seconds late," for all season ticket-holders have special permission from the railway company to put trains into the feminine gender. This is a slight compensation for having to pay again when they are challenged and can only pull out a complimentary pass to the Chrysanthemum Show.