LAY DOWN YOUR ARMS!

Evening Post, Volume CVIII, Issue 120, 16 November 1929, Page 22

LAY DOWN YOUR ARMS!

la-the biggest city of the world a man was walking. Seven millions of people worked, played, lived around him, and beside hini, and above him. Ceaseless, heavy roar of traffic; ceaseless surge of- people; endless, crawling stream of car and omnibus; overhead flash of trains . . .London. And in London, on a sudden, silence. Just as if a hand had been held, sharply, against the city's turmoil. The silence wag vast—almost frightening—after the noise. It seemed more powerful, louder even than the noise itself. i'What is it, daddy V asked a child?a awed-voice. '• ■ ' The man explained, simply. It was the two minutes' silence for Armistice Day. A little space while we remember the ending of the greatest war the world has ever kno>vn. Two minutes . . . and a thought for the men who had returned from the war . . . and a prayer |or the men who had not. The silence ceased. Like a beast waking from slumber, London "stirred, and there began a^ain the. continuous, deep-toned growling that meant count-, less busy popple „'..,* the working at countless; rnjn-niade. rnacltiues. ■■■'' The chiJ4 said: Xlt was not a very long time,, daddy, with Such a lot of things to remember. Only two minutes." ■■';; "' . • ' ■ • M Long enough to stop a war between nations," answered ,the. man. Armistice IlayTT-rfhe eleyenth of November, 1918. Lay down your arjns! . But the, remembering? The child and the mjiri pa.ssed; through- the square, where wreajihs lay piled on the monument. ■'"'■.''■■'■<■ ■'■■ '• ■": ; In .a great, glittering window they saw a stark picture—row upon row of small wooden crosses somowhorp in Prance. . ■ i - > '-". . .... And in the eyes o£ the'people who passed ■ was reflected some of .the sombreness and memory of that time, when:, nationsfought against nation. .The two, minutes' silence was a little symbol of courtesy, of acknowledgment, on Armistice Day. London had not forgotten the Great War. And did you, last Monday, when you were at school or in your own homes and heard the boom of the gun—you also kept silence. You may not have remembered . . . you may not have understood ... but you gave a thought for nations at peace and the men who died . . . and the happiness and security of your own country. ' . ": •; ; r : Armistice Day „ .Day of IJemem- .. ranee.'

'"".■■ CAN YOU Dp IT? , Place a small cork on the floor nust in front of you, and then go down till you are resting on the tips- of your toes and the palms of your hnnds, keeping your lenees straight. The thing is to loafer your body and pick up the cork with your mouth. This is not so very, very difficult,,but, you see, you are supposed to dp it twice,-re-placing the cork with your mouth the1 first time,'and then picking it up again, raising and lowering your'body as you do it. " DANA. Lower Hutfc.

"WE HAVE SOME LOVELY ROSES'.' "W? have spuie lovely 'roses in our garden now. I have a'rowpf strawberries, but the berries are not quite :WP6'y«V I ha,ye a- little flower-garden J too, There are some tiny asters in it. and a row of sweetpeas that have not been planted very long. Our Shetland pony likes sugar, and he will eat bread too. Daddy gives me a rido on him sometimes;'' '*KEWPIE." Levin;

"ISN'T IT DISTRESSING?'? "_lsn't it distressing when something spoils the look of a thing you liko very much? I jas% love that .'bunch of daffies you sent us to paint ana I couldn't resist doing them at night, but it dried quite a different colour-in daylight from what I had'thought" it to' be, so pur neighbour was kind'enough to give me another Pairy Ring page." "MRS. TITTLEMOtfSE.^ . Aewtown,.

"GUY PAWKES AGAIN." "Last night my brother and another ' boy were letting off crackers in our! back yard, but I stayed inside. After- i wards my father came homo with some j top, sp he started lighting them and throwing them in the. yard so that th&y hit the boys." ; ' ' ■■ ' EILEEN DUMBLETON.' Melrose. '

"DANCE, LITTLE DOLL." "We have a nice new home, and Paddy has a lovely lot of vegetables: 18. the garden, and he is setting a great pig Jawn in front for me to play on in the summer time. I have also a beautiful Scotch collie dog, and his nanio is Roy. He * such a lovely doggie, and likes me to play chasing with him !■ would like 'you to call me 'Dutch Doll-.- when you answer my letter." VALERIE NIELY. Isgaio. ■ • ■ ' '

THE DOCTOR AND THE LIQN. An ■ amusing reason for reducing a doctor's bill was given in the Court of Appeal at Nancy. ■ , ■ The doctor, had been called in by a travelling pircus proprietor to prescribe for a bear and a dromedary and to operate on, a lion, and, his bill was 17,000 francs, which was reduced by half because the doctor had obtained a.great deal of professional publicty from the operation. We can imagine an old Northern farmer writing: ''Dear Mr, Mac Angus,—l must refuse to pay your bill. When you came, to see my wife it took you three hours to fight your way through the snowdrifts, and on getting home you had to have on? of-your toes amputated for; frostbite, and it was in all the papers under the headline, Heroic Doctor's Struggle to Beach Dyspeptic Patient. In consequence of the free advertisement you obtained we think you should pay us, eomijiission, and not tend in an tfxorbitant bill for five shillings." When this begins tp happen there will be fewer doctors.