When Jackson first joined the jolly old B.E.F. he smoked a pipe. He carried it anyhow. Loose in his pocket, mind you. A pipe-bowl at his pocket's brim a simple pipe-bowl was to him, and it was nothing more. Of course no decent B.E.F. mess could stand that. Jackson was told that a pipe was anathema maranatha, which is Greek for no bon.

"What will I smoke then?" said Jackson, who was no Englishman. We waited for the Intelligence Officer to reply. We knew him. The Intelligence Officer said nothing. He drew something from his pocket. It was a parcel wrapped in cloth-of-gold. He removed the cloth-of-gold and there was discovered a casket, which he unlocked with a key attached to his identity disc. Inside the casket was a padlocked box, which he opened with a key attached by gold wire to his advance pay-book. Inside the box was a roll of silk. To cut it all short, he unwound puttee after puttee of careful wrapping till he reached a chamois-leather chrysalis, which he handled with extreme reverence, and from this he drew something with gentle fingers, and set it on the table-cloth before the goggle-eyed Jackson.

"A pipe," said Jackson.

There was a shriek of horror. The Intelligence Officer fainted. Here was wanton sacrilege.

"Man," said the iron-nerved Bombing Officer, "it's a Brownhill."

"What's a Brownhill?" asked Jackson.

We gasped. How could we begin to tell him of that West End shrine from which issue these lacquered symbols of a New Religion?

The Intelligence Officer was reviving. We looked to him.

"The prophet Brownhill," he said, "was once a tobacconist—an ordinary tobacconist who sold pipes."

We shuddered.

"He discovered one day that man wants more than mere pipes. He wants a—a super-pipe, something to reverence and—er—look after, you know, as well as to smoke. So he invented the Brownhill. It is an affaire de coeur—an affair of art," translated the I.O. proudly. "It is as glossy as a chestnut in its native setting, and you can buy furniture polish from the prophet Brownhill which will keep it always so. It has its year, like a famous vintage, it has a silver wind-pipe, and it costs anything up to fifty guineas."

"D'you smoke it'?" asked Jackson, brutally.

We gave him up. In awful silence each of us produced his wrappings and his caskets, extracted the shining briar, smeared it with cosmetics, and polished it more reverently than a peace time Guardsman polishes his buttons when warned for duty next day at "Buck."

And Jackson smoked his pipe in secret. He would take no leaf from the book of the Sassenachs.

And the War went on.

Jackson went on leave. To his deep disgust he had to wait a few hours in London on his way to more civilised parts, and fate led him idling to Brownhill's. He flattened his Celtic nose on the window and stared fascinated at the array of super-pipes displayed there. After a furtive glance along the street he crept into the temple. A white-coated priest met him. </>

"I—I'm wantin'—a—a pipe," said Jackson. He saw the priest reel and turn pale to the lips. "I should say a—a Brownhill," he added hastily. The other man gulped, steadied himself with an effort, and gave a ghastly smile. If you had walked into a temple at Thibet and planked down sixpence and asked for an idol wrapped up in brown paper you could not have done a more dreadful thing than Jackson had done; but the priest forgave him and produced in silence a trayful of Brownhills. Then was Jackson like unto ELIA'S little Chinese boy with "the crackling." He touched a briar and was converted. He stroked them as though they were kittens, bought ten of them, a pound of polish, fifty silver wind-pipes and a bale of chamois-leather. The priest took a deep breath.

"You are a full-blooded man, Sir," said he, "if you will excuse me saying so, and you should smoke in your new Brownhills a mixture which has a proportion of Latakia to Virginian of one to nineteen—a small percentage of glycerine and cucumber being added because you have red hair, and the whole submitted to a pressure of eighteen hundred foot-pounds to the square millimetre, under violet rays. This will be known as 'Your Mixture,' Number 56785-6/11, and will be supplied to no one else on earth, except under penalty of death.

"I will take a ton," said Jackson with glazing eyes.

This was a man after the priest's own heart. He took another deep breath and dived into the strong-room. He returned under the escort of ten armed men, each of them chained by the wrist to an iron box, which he unlocked with difficulty. Inside the iron box was a thing which Jackson a few months ago would have called a pipe. He knew better now. In awful silence the priest lifted it from its satin bed. "This," he whispered, "was once smoked by Brownhill himself."

Jackson put out a hand to take it. The priest hesitated, then laid it gently on his customer's palm.

And Jackson dropped it.

Jackson has never been heard of since.

THE FAIRIES HAVE NEVER A PENNY TO SPEND.

R. F.

RARA AVIS.

From a cigarette-card:—

"REED WARBLER.

"Acrocephalus streperus.

"This bird is found in nearly every part of the British Islands. It builds a nest about a foot off the ground in the reed beds, and is formed of grass, horse hair and sometimes feathers."

From a list of medallists of the new Order of the British Empire:—

"G. P. Hamlet.—For courage in persisting with dangerous work, with a certainty of suffering from poisoning as a result."

Just like his illustrious namesake.

"Melbourne, Friday.
"The House of Representatives to-day passed the second reading of the War Times Profits Tax Assessment Bill. The tax will be 50 per cent. for the year ending June 30, 191161, and 75 per cent. for afterwards.—Reuter."
Aberdeen Paper.

Well, well, we need not worry.

"What is being fought out is a long-drawn battle for the important shipping port of Trieste, with the whole of the railway and road communications of the Iberian Peninsula."
The People.

Rather a shock for Madrid.