Ah! Bernard, say our pageants were not wasted, Not vain the Adjutant's laborious blush! Was it to Maud this glowing morn you hasted With yonder bauble in its bed of plush-- Or was it that Miss Blake? Say not you faced, with ill-concealed dismay, Your thronging townsmen and had nought to say, Or from your KING stepped tremblingly away With someone else's Order by mistake! Surely you shamed us not! for all that splendour Can scarce have been more moving to the heart Than our glad rites, the Princess not so tender As was myself, who always took that part; I cannot think the KING, Nor gorgeous Lords, nor Officers of State, Nor seedy people peering through the gate, Felt half so proud or so affectionate As those far friends when _we_ arranged the thing. A.P.H. * * * * * DISCONCERTING NEWS FOR THE KAISER. Woman to Vicar: "Please Sir will you write to our George in France? 'is number is a 'undred and eleven million four thousand and six." * * * * * "The inmates of buses have changed, too. All classes travel side by side, the perspiring flower girl, with her heavy basket of roses, the charwoman clutching her morning purchase of fish, the daintily dressed lady going out to dinner, &c."--_The Daily Chronicle_. A very early dinner, apparently; perhaps with the charwoman. * * * * * [Illustration: FREEDOM RENEWS HER VOW. AUGUST 14, 1917.] * * * * * ESSENCE OF PARLIAMENT. _Monday, July 30th._--The _obiter dicta_ dropped by Mr. BONAR LAW in the course of debate are gradually furnishing the House with an almost complete autobiography. To-day it learned that while, unlike Mr. BALFOUR, he reads a great many newspapers he does not include among them a certain financial organ which makes a speciality of spy-hunting in high places. [Illustration: RAMSAY MACDONALD IN PARIS. "ARC DE TRIOMPHE! THE WORD HAS A SINISTER SOUND."] When the National Insurance Scheme was set on foot there were great complaints because some Friendly Societies were not allowed to share in its administration. Possibly the officials thought them a little too friendly in their ways. One of them, we learned to-day, employed an auditor who signed the return with a mark, like _Bill Stumps_; while another auditor had a habit of signing it in blank and leaving the secretary to fill in the figures.