I have been reading with much enjoyment, and I hope profit, a book entitled _Behind the Ivory Gate; Being the Reminiscences of a Dentist_, by Orlando Pullar, F.R.D.S. Mr. Pullar's opportunities for studying the psychology of his clients have been exceptional, and he has turned them to rich account in these fascinating pages. He is, moreover, as adroit with his pen as with the instruments of his humane and benevolent calling, and has a pretty wit. Thus he tells us that his villa at Balham is named "Tusculum," and that, in view of the fact that three generations of Pullars have been dentists, his family can be said to be of "old extraction." This pleasant quip I seem to have heard before; but, with all deductions, there are many signs here of a strong sagacious mind, that brings to bear on all the jars of daily life the priceless emollient of moral uplift. * * * * * [Illustration: THE HYPNOTIST. BETHMANN-HOLLWEG: "KEEP LOOKING AT ME. YOU'RE WINNING THE WAR! YOU'RE WINNING THE WAR! YOU'RE WINNING THE WAR!"] * * * * * THE MUD LARKS. Never have I seen a kiltie platoon wading through the cold porridge of snow and slush of which our front used to be composed, but I have said, with my French friend, "_Mon Dieu, les currents d'air!_" and thank Fate that I belong to a race which reserves its national costume for fancy-dress balls. It is very well for MacAlpine of Ben Lomond, who has stalked his haggis and devoured it raw, who beds down on thistles for preference and grows his own fur; but it is very hard on Smith of Peckham, who through no fault of his own finds himself in a Highland regiment, trying to make his shirt-tails do where his trousers did before. But the real heather-mixture, double-distilled Scot is a hardy bird with different ideas from _nous autres_ as to what is cold: also as to what is hot. Witness the trying experience of our Albert Edward. Our Albert Edward and a Hun rifle grenade arrived at the same place at the same time, intermingled and went down to the Base to be sifted. In the course of time came a wire from our Albert Edward, saying he had got the grenade out of his system and was at that moment at the railhead; were we going to send him a horse or weren't we? Emma was detailed for the job, which was a mistake, because Emma was not the mount for a man who had been softening for five months in hospital. She had only two speeds in her repertoire, a walk which slung you up and down her back from her ears to her croup, and a trot which jarred your teeth loose and rattled the buttons off your tunic. However, she went to the railhead and Albert Edward mounted her, threw the clutch into the first speed and hammered out the ten miles to our camp, arriving smothered in snow and so stiff we had to lift him down, so raw it was a mockery to offer him a chair, and therefore he had to take his tea off the mantelpiece.