* * * * * JULES FRANCOIS. Jules Francois is poet, and gallant and gay; Jules Francois makes frocks in the Rue de la Paix; Since the mobilisation Jules Francois's the one That sits by the breech of a galloping gun, In the team of a galloping gun! When the wheatfields of August stood white on the plain Jules Francois was ordered to go to Lorraine, Since the guns would get flirting with good Mr. KRUPP And wanted Jules Francois to limber them up, To lay and to limber them up! The road it was dusty, the road it was long, But there was Jules Francois to make you a song; He sang them a song, and he fondled his gun, Though I wouldn't translate it he sang it A1; His battery thought it A1! The morning was fresh and the morning was cool When they stopped in an orchard two miles out of Toul, And the grey muzzles spat through the grey muzzles' smoke, And there was Jules Francois to make you a joke, To crack his idea of a joke:-- "The road to our Paris 'tis hard as can be; The road to that London he halts at the sea; So, _vois-tu, mon gars_? 'tis as certain as sin This wisdom that chooses the road to Berlin!" So they follow the road to Berlin. * * * * * ENTER BINGO. Before I introduce Bingo I must say a word for Humphrey, his sparring partner. Humphrey found himself on the top of my stocking last December--put there, I fancy, by Celia, though she says it was Father Christmas. He is a small yellow dog, with glass optics, and the label round his neck said, "His eyes move." When I had finished the oranges and sweets and nuts, when Celia and I had pulled the crackers, Humphrey remained over to sit on the music-stool, with the air of one playing the pianola. In this position he found his uses. There are times when a husband may legitimately be annoyed; at these times it was pleasant to kick Humphrey off his stool on to the divan, to stand on the divan and kick him on to the sofa, to stand on the sofa and kick him on to the book-case; and then, feeling another man, to replace him on the music-stool and apologise to Celia. It was thus that he lost his tail. When the War broke out we wrote to the War Office, offering to mobilise Humphrey. Already he could do "Eyes _right_, eyes _front_." But the loss of his tail was against him. Rejected by the medical authorities as unfit, he returned to the music-stool and waited for a job. It was at this moment that Bingo joined the establishment.