The days of decorative art are done
That made the toothsome biscuit more enticing
(Even our wedding-cake when we are one
Will be denuded of its outer icing);
Yea, purest joy of all that we resign,
A ban is laid upon the luscious tartlet
By him who has for your sweet tooth and mine
No mercy in his heartlet.

And yet, if England, in her night of need,
Debauched by pastry-cook and muffin-monger,
Would have us curb our natural gift of greed
And merely mitigate the pangs of hunger,
Let us renounce life's sweetness from to-day,
And turn, for Hobson's choice, to something higher;
"Good-bye, Criterion!" let us bravely say,
And "Farewell, Rumpelmeyer!"

O.S.

* * * * *

A PROPER PROPORTION.

(_An Interview with Mr. H.G. WELLS_).

I found the Sage, as I had expected, in his study at Omniscience Lodge.
There he sat in his new suit of Britlings, surrounded by novels and stories
in MS. dealing with every aspect of human affairs, sixty of the more