The real question is how those who never got on to the note contrive
to get off it.

* * * * *

[Illustration: _Mother_ (_reading paper_). "I SEE A BAKER'S BEEN FINED
TEN POUNDS FOR SELLING BREAD LESS THAN TWELVE HOURS OLD."

_Alan_ (_who now goes to school by train_--_joining in_). "OH, THINK!
AND HE MIGHT HAVE PULLED THE CORD AND STOPPED THE TRAIN _TWICE_ FOR
THAT!"]

* * * * *

OUR BOOKING-OFFICE.

(_BY MR. PUNCH'S STAFF OF LEARNED CLERKS_.)

When I first read the title of _Secret Bread_ (HEINEMANN) my idea
was--well, what would anyone naturally think but that here was a
romance of food-hoarding, a tale of running the potato blockade and
the final discovery of a hidden cellar full of fresh rolls? But of
course I was quite wrong. The name has nothing to do with food, other
than mental; it stands for the sustaining idea (whatever it is)
that each one of us keeps locked in his heart as the motive of his
existence. With _Ishmael Ruan_, the hero of Miss F. TENNYSON JESSE'S
novel, this hidden motive was love of the old farm-house hall of
Cloom, and a wish to hand it on, richer, to his son. _Ishmael_
inherited Cloom himself because, though the youngest of a large