AND WHY NOT?

Dominion, Volume 9, Issue 2718, 13 March 1916, Page 6

AND WHY NOT?

i AMUSING WAR ANECDOTE. An amusing anecdote containing caustic rofernces to the' Kaiser and the Crown Prince is told in a letter to Paris from Berlin. Tlie writer, a lad.y living m the German capital, forwarded tho story by a circuitous route to a friend in Paris. Tho story, which is current all over Germany, relates tho following dialogues at the medical examination of men rejected early in tho war and now called up a second time: — Colonel to First llecruit: What's tho matter with you ? llecruit: My left arm is short and hall' paralysed. Colonel: What docs that matter P And His Majesty'the Emperor—does it pre-' vont him from winning victories? (Passed for activc service.) Second Recruit: I have rheumatics in the legs, hands, and shoulder. Colonel: Rheumatics! What about Marshal von Hindenburg? Have his rheumatics prevented him from scoring glorious successes? (Passed.) The third recruit, a hopeless imbecile, with a vacant smile, who is brought before the officer by his mother, who says: My son has been an luiot since his birth. Colonel (rising to his feet with an assumed indignation): Idiot, you say. Isn't the Crown Prince an idiot? l!ut that doesn't prevent him from being a soldier or even a general. (Passed.)