JOTTINGS.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXXX, Issue 51, 27 October 1914, Page 5

JOTTINGS.

The -Marlborough war fund totals £2SGO. and the Poor in Britain and Belgium Fund ,01070. A story which is causing a good deal of amusement in Kngland just now relates to a suburban resident who, issuing from \ ictoria Station, Ltmdon, asked the postman lie met to tell him the quickest way to Westminster Hospital. “Go into the middle of the street,” was the prompt answer, “and call for three cheers for the" Kaiser.” .Referring to the physical training of the new British recruits, a correspondent in the “Manchester Guardian” says it is very difficult to cure some men of the habit of month-breath-ing; so, partly, by way of penalty, partly by way of precaution, the regimental doctors have obtained a supply of babies’ dummies, and if a man is caught disobeying the order about breathing he is made to pop one into his mouth ahd keep it there. Probably Field-Marshal Sir John French and Field-Marshal Sir Evelyn Wood furnish the only instances in British military history of an officer quitting the Royal Navy to rise to the highest distinction in the sister 'service, As a sailor, Sir Evelyn served with the Naval Brigade in the Crimea, and greatly distinguished himself at the Redan, but Sir John French saw no active service during the font years he was in the Navy. “’E don’t hark, hut, my gawd, ’e’s a beggar to bite.” was how a Tommy once summed up the leader of the British Expeditionary Force.

The other day, when the hoys for the front were marching through Melbourne, there was a lot of muttered grumbling at the fact that two or three well-defined Germans had been accepted as officers with the contingent. The young soldiers complain of the foolishness of admitting a dubious element into a life-or-death speculation, and the fathers of the lads share their misgivings. - Perhaps by the time the troops get to camp on the other side the British military authorities will have come at last'to the conclusion that suspicion is the better part of prudence in the game of war, and will decide to dispense with people who have a. tendency to the name of Schmidt. Jonesco from Rumania might he a safer investment.