[Footnote A: Great play is made in Strauss's _Elektra_ with the
"slippery blood" motive.]

The campaign of lies goes on with immense energy in all neutral countries,
for the Kaiser is evidently of opinion that the pen is perhaps mightier
than the sword.

At home the great improvisation of the New Armies, undertaken by Lord
Kitchener in the teeth of much expert criticism, goes steadily on. Lord
Kitchener asked for 500,000 men, and he has got them. On September 10 the
House voted another half million. The open spaces in Hyde Park are given
over to training; women are beginning to take the place of men. Already the
spirit of the new soldiers is growing akin to that of the regulars. One of
Mr. Punch's brigade, who has begun to send his impressions of the mobilised
Territorials, sums it up very well when he says that, amateurs or
professionals, they are all very much alike. "Feed them like princes and
pamper them like babies, and they'll complain all the time. But stand them
up to be shot at and they'll take it as a joke, and rather a good joke,
too." Lord Roberts maintains a dignified reticence, but that is "Bobs'
way":

He knew, none better, how 'twould be,
And spoke his warning far and wide:
He worked to save us ceaselessly,
Setting his well-earned ease aside.

We smiled and shrugged and went our way,
Blind to the swift approaching blow:
His every word proves true to-day,