* * * * * OUR BOOKING-OFFICE. (_By Mr. Punch's Staff of Learned Clerks._) _The German War Book_ (MURRAY) is a work in whose authenticity many of us would have refused to believe this time last year. It is a pity indeed that it was not then in the hands of all those who still clung to the theory that the Prussian was a civilised and humane being. However, now that everyone can read it, translated and with a wholly admirable preface by Professor J. H. MORGAN, it is to be hoped that the detestable little volume will have a wide publicity. True, it can add little to our recent knowledge of the enemy of mankind; but it is something to have his guiding principles set down upon the authority of his own hand. Cynical is hardly an adequate epithet for them; indeed I do not know that the word exists that could do full justice to the compound of hypocrisy and calculated brutishness that makes up this manual. It may at first strike the reader as surprising to find himself confronted by sentiments almost, one might say, of moderation and benevolence. He will ask with astonishment if the writer has not, after all, been maligned. Before long, however, he will discover that all this morality is very carefully made conditional, and that the conditions are wide. In short, as the Preface puts it, the peculiar logic of the book consists in "ostentatiously laying down unimpeachable rules, and then quietly destroying them by debilitating exceptions." For example, on the question of exposing the inhabitants of occupied territory to the fire of their own troops--the now notorious Prussian method of "women and children first"--the _War Book_, while admitting pious distaste for such practice, blandly argues that its "main justification" lies in its success. Thus, with sobs and tears, like the walrus, the Great General Staff enumerates its suggested list of serviceable infamies. At the day of reckoning what a witness will this little book be! Out of their own mouths they stand here condemned through all the ages. * * * * *