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FROM OUR STALL.

MISS TERRY has left the stage. I am told that she is to be married, and that is certainly the reason that is generally assigned for her taking this decisive step; but I cannot help thinking that that charming young lady and excellent actress retires from public life because a woman of her keen sense of the ridiculous must be absolutely so disgusted with the sickening adulation with which MR. TOM TAYLOR so persistently bespatters her, that she takes the only means in her power of freeing herself from it. What has she done that she is to be held up to public ridicule by MR. TOM TAYLOR in the Times twice a week? It is really very hard on her. Come, MISS TERRY, don't go yet. Haven't you any relation who is in a position to put a stop to the nuisance? We really can't afford to lose you; we can't, indeed. You are a genuine artist, with a thorough and comprehensive knowledge of your profession; and there are not many now on the stage of whom as much can be said. Your Juliet is not your strongest part, but it is probably the best Juliet our present stage can afford.

MR. AND MRS. HOWARD PAUL are playing at the Strand. These excellent artists are drawing crowded houses, although the earlier half of their bill remains unchanged. The latter part consists of miscellaneous songs and scenas. The most noticeable of these is "Faust in Five Minutes," by MR. HOWARD, and "The Ship on Fire," and the "Sneezing Song," by MRS. PAUL. That lady's excellent impersonation of MR. SIMS REEVES concludes the entertainment, as usual.

MR. MACCABE has re-opened at the Egyptian Hall with "Begone Dull Care." He has many qualities which go to make up a good entertainment-he is a good mimic, a good ventriloquist, and he sings his songs with taste and effect. His "make-up," however, is generally very careless, and seems to show a lack of that appreciation of character to which he frequently refers (with a modesty that is quite his own) as his peculiar forte. These remarks do not, however, apply to his personification of a gushing young lady--which is admirably dressed, and in every way perfect. MR. MACCABE should allow himself a little more time for his changes, and cut out of his book all allusion to the beauty of his own songs.

A PROXY.

LET me kiss you for your mother-
For your sister-cousin-aunt-
Or for somebody or other

Whom I long to kiss and can't.
I could wish my love beside me
As I've you beside me now;
But the pleasure is denied me,
So I'll kiss you, anyhow.

I adore the lady dearly

(I assure you that I do);
Can you understand me clearly
That my kiss is not for you?
In your keeping I may leave it,
As another's-not your own:
So I beg you'll not receive it
As a gift, but as a loan.

You have silken, yellow tresses,
While my love's are black as night;
And your eyes-e'en Love confesses-
Are a dozen times as bright.

But I covet from another

What another cannot grant;
So I'll kiss you for your mother-
Or your sister-cousin-aunt!

Pious Pyrotechnics.

THE Pall Mall stated the other day that at the dedication festival of St. Bartholomew, Moor-lane, when FATHER IGNATIUS took part, the curate in charge, the REV. A. SQUIB, preached the sermon (which, by the way, only lasted six minutes-don't we wish St. B.'s was in our parish!). We understand that nothing but the dread of an action for libel has prevented the Record from denouncing A. SQUIB as a Roman Candle.

Cutting Acquaintances.

THE "brotherhood of art" is all very well as a sentiment, but it won't bear dissection. Take the profession of engraving for instance. How few of its followers can rank even as CouSENS?

Answers to Correspondents.

[We cannot return rejected MSS. or Sketches unless they are accompanied by a stamped and directed envelope. We can take no notice of communications with illegible signatures or monograms.]

AJAX TRANSPIERCED.-Would do well to have that tooth out, and a little sense in.

C. B. (Reading.)-Neat lines; but "far fairer beams Hope's rock"-on which we split! DUNN BROWN wants to see his rubbish in "a nook in our columns." He will see it-with an 'ook!

J. W. T. (New Wandsworth.)-There is no necessity at all! W. S. (Spa Fields, Dublin.)-Will, perhaps, be kind enough to send us stamps for the extra postage his, in every sense, heavy contribution cost us. S.-"Sinner" can't rhyme with "dimmer." Don't!

J. E. W.-The lines possess no merit.

SLATER.-It is impossible to parse Cookery receipts, but we judge them by their fruits and acquit them.

R. S. (Leicester-square).-Of no use to us.

C. B. S. (Marchmont-street.)-We have no opening for such matters. W. G. (Aylesbury.)-Oh, you're all right;-there are no jokes, old or new, in what you send.

LITTLE FRANKY.-Good boy!

CANTAB can't hab a place in our columns.

A. B. (Hull.)-The sketch is hull-ly incomprehensible. R. A. (Lincoln's-inn-fields.)-Please to read our regulations. Declined with thanks :-Physicist; F. H. B.; G. F. B.; A. C.; F. C.; H. G.; L. G., Glasgow; Drink and Dropsy; Paddy Greener, Dublin; X.; Bobby Hawk; H. G. W.; J. H., Throgmorton-street; Miss J., Isle of Man; A. S., Dublin; G. L. H.; J. A. E., Glasgow; F. A. B. G. H. K., etc.; J. E.; W. H., Liverpool; Underground; C. L.; Miss L. T., Brixton; H. H., Northampton; Mus!; C. W. S., Cecil-street; J. H. C., Sittingbourne;' J. B., Oxford; H. H., Burslem; N. J. E.; F. J., StockClapham-road; Alpha, Camberwell; Medici; Original, Leicester; R. D. T., well; Harry the Wag; W. W. B., Bristol; F. H. G., Grosvenor-square; W. F. H. Cook; M. B., Houndsditch; B. H., Bradford: A. S., Paisley; Lucret; O. R., Birmingham; J. Y., West Bromwich; J. M .P., Winchester; M. E. H. W.: Lark; Nemesis; "Still a Child."

CUPID AND CROQUET.

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I.

NE day on high Olympus, forging thunderbolts and fuming,

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Sat Jove, by gods surrounded, sipping nectar, as we're told,
And he drew out from his pocket just a poster unassuming,
Printed bright in fiery letters, on a double sheet of gold;
Then said JUPITER to MERCURY, who happened to be boarding
In Olympus with his brother gods and goddesses a night,
"Paste the poster, trusty messenger, on wall and corner hoarding,
That the deities who run may read, and running, read aright.'

II.

Swift flew the glad intelligence, how JUPITER intended

To ask each witty god and wily goddess to compete
For a mighty prize he'd offered, on which fortunes he'd expended,
For breaking women's hearts, and bringing lovers to their feet.
"Seek me out a jolly pastime, game, amusement, if you like it,
Wherein mortal men and women," said the king of gods, can join.
When the iron, of the heart, is hot I dearly love to strike it,
Though some bachelors are needy, and some women roll in coin.'

III.

66

PAN and BACCHUS came together, with a double sort of notion,
Of picnics on the river, sunny girls, and iced champagne,
With a dream of woods, forget-me-nots, a boat's delicious motion,
Songs and sentiments, and happiness-bar PLUVIUS and rain;
And they told how opportunities were advertised for strolling,
And of couples who have lost themselves-pretended to, at least,-
Of ferny banks, and attitudes, and rugs, and lazy lolling,
Lobster salad, wine in tumblers, and a very awkward feast.

IV.

To Jove's throne, in exultation, young TERPSICHORE came dancing,
She had notions of excitement running strangely in her head,
And in vivid colours painted, lights, and flowers, bright eyes glancing,
And the waltzes which have little loves to HYMEN's altar led;
And she told of sweet flirtations, over lemon-water ices,

And of sweeter assignations when the cloaks are wrapt around;
Hinting strongly, how a trois-temps has led boobies to a crisis,
And the comfort of conservatories mothers oft have found.

V.

Then with horsey slang and laughter, came DIANA in a canter,
Shouting loudly to the loungers to get out and clear the way;
And with noisy volubility propounded she instanter,

How she'd tame the wildest chesnut and the most pugnacious bav;
Then she raved of hounds and hunting, meets, and horses tame and vicious,
And the "go-ahead, well-plucked ones," "snobs in scarlet who disturb;"
And she hinted how men's tempers, like their horses, are capricious,

And how dainty women's fingers are the lightest on the curb.

VI.

Then APOLLO, the far-darter, came with arrows in his quiver,
And was loud in exultation of the lesson of the bow;
But the deities all shouted, "With your quiver to the river!"
And protested how that archery, and archers too, were slow.
When he tried a mild suggestion of toxophilites and parties,

Where for shooting and flirtation men and women oft are brought,

"Down at Plymouth," said old NEPTUNE, "when they shoot, you know, my

hearties,

For a dozen married women I have very vainly sought."

VII.

Little CUPID, for a minute, had escaped from APHRODITE,
Very plump and very hearty, as all honest love should be,
And he said, "I've found a game out, never slow and never flighty,
And it's capable of skill as well as spooning, as you'll see."
Then he sang a song of croquet, of its present and hereafter,
With such exquisite persuasion, and such mischief in his eyes,
That the deities, delighted, shook Olympus with their laughter,
And to CUPID was awarded, for his cheekiness, the prize!

A Hint. WHEREFORE this rage for sauces? Literature is paling before condiments, and the "Chef" sauce is advertised almost as extensively as the Broadway. The hoardings of London at the present moment must be a source of irritation to a hungry man. "The" sauce fights for the mastery with the "Chef," so ably recommended for dyspepsia; while the "Mancunium" insists upon stepping in with another claim for recognition, and a reminder that hitherto we have not been posted in the classical name for Manchester. But what have these piccalilly merchants been at not to have hit upon the one great title for gherkins which would delicately combine fact with fancy? Think of the flaring announcement on the walls, "Try our MANSFIELD Curry," or "For irritable patients there is no remedy like JERVIS' Pickles!

Quite So.

"AN advocate of fair play" writes to protest against the outcry which certain railway shareholders are making about the failure of a gigantic contracting firm. He says-with some show of reason-that a man deserves to lose his money if he places it in the hands of a firm which is practically PETO-and bets!

Dog French.

A VETERINARY Surgeon of our acquaintance, who has just returned from the French Exhibition with a smattering of the language, has given to one ward in his "Hospital for Dogs" what he calls the appropriate title of the salle à manger.

THE LOBLOLLY LETTERS.

A DOMESTIC DRAMA SET FORTH IN A FEW FAMILIAR EPISTLES. [From Miss Julia Loblolly, Broadstairs, to Miss Aminta Jipkittle, Nor

wood.]

MY DEAR MINTY,-As I promised, when I left Athene Lodge, and "the almost motherly care of the MISSES NIPPER (N.B. French, dancing, and music extra)," I write to tell you that a most important event in my life seems to be looming in the distance. Since I quitted the Academy I have, as you know, been living with my uncle CALEB, who is, alas, an oil and Italian warehouseman, having inherited the business from my grandfather, while my late pa deviated into the artistic branch of it by painting in oils, and having a picture once in the Royal Academy. Although at his death, owing to the mere solid advantages of trade over the fame of the painter's profession (and the picture was noticed in one of the papers, though hung somewhere near the ceiling), I have been compelled to reside with my uncle; I trust I have a soul above pickles and salad oil, and have ever sighed for some loftier sphere, who would have the manners of a gentleman, and the means of something above the common.

I believe my aunt, who is a woman without any mind, and doesn't know it two minutes together, is thinking of me for one of my cousins, only she can't quite decide which. GEORGE is the eldest, and is a predestined oil-and-Italian, so that I dismiss him at once. WILLIAM is at the London University, or some such place, studying to be a natural philosopher, or something of the kind, only he reminds me so dreadfully of the Polytechnic and Miss JANE NIPPER's lectures on Natural Science, that I can't bear him. The rest of the family are young, my aunt apparently couldn't make up her mind for six years or so whether she would have any more children after GEORGE, WILLIAM, and MATILDA (such a guy, MINTY!), and then made up for lost time with twins, and one every year since.

My uncle destines me for his manager, Mr. PIPPINGS-a short, pale man, with freckles and red hair. A coronet would be dear at such a price a possible partnership in a pickle trade impossible !

We have been down here a week. It's a delightful and very little place, with a little bay-GEORGE says it's so small, its only a bay-bay -all to itself. It is more select, and less numerous than Ramsgate and Margate, and very quiet. The pier is so small, GEORGE says it's only a courtesy title, and there are only about a dozen bathing machines. There's a cliff and a promenade, with a place GEORGE calls "the gardens of Gull”—a grass-plat with eight or ten tame seagulls walking about. They seem to belong to an old lady who keeps the usual seaside shell-and-alabaster stall. GEORGE calls her "the old gu(r)l"-he's always making his stupid jokes, and trying to be agreeable.

But all this is not what I meant by looming in the future. I have made the acquaintance of such a dear duck of a handsome creature. He is quite le militaire, and his name is ACIER, and such a duck of a moustache, and such boots, and he is so clever, and knows everybody. He came down in the same boat with us to Margate, and we made quite friends. He pointed me out Mr. CH*RL*8 D*CK N8 here on the beach yesterday-not at all like his photographs, for he is about six feet high, stout in proportion, no whiskers, and bald. He knows ALGERNON (that is that dear Mr. ACIER's name), quite well, and bowed to him when he was walking with me!

There! but I must conclude, for it is just post-time. More in my next. Your loving

JULIA L.

P.S.-I don't sign my surname in full, because-but as you so often said, no girl can help her surname, it is her duty to try and select a

better.

P.S.S.-WILLIAM, the natural philosopher, is endeavouring to solve the problem why all the doors at seaside lodgings never shut properly, and can only be opened by turning the handle in exactly the opposite direction to the ordinary.

[Mr. Caleb Loblolly, Broadstairs, to Mr. Pippings, Oil and Italian Warehouse, Lower Carboy-street, City.]

DEAR SIR,-This family, consigned per steamboat to Margate, and on by conveyance, as arranged before leaving London, was duly delivered on the afternoon of Monday last. No damages in transit, with the exception of a flask of best oil broken in Mrs. L.'s box.

coarse.

We find the situation airy and salubrious, with a fine opening for the junior branches on the sands. We could not recommend the sand here for ordinary scouring purposes, being of an inferior sort, and rather Mr. GEORGE went out fishing two days ago. His alleged in tention was to catch sprats with a view to discovering if they are the sardines of commerce in a state of nature; but whether the idea was prompted by a spirit of fun, or an eye to business, I cannot say, for, as you know, I regret to say the future head of the business displays a levity quite inconsistent with the oil and Italian interests.

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200

THE PROMENADE CONCERTS. TO LETITIA-ANN AT MARGATE FROM MATILDA-JANE IN LONDON. DEAR LETTY,-Now that you are amongst the fashionables as have gone out of town, I think I must say that it's you as should write to me; at least such is what I always heard was the case in the Family Herald Etiket Book, that it is the superior as first takes notice, and that makes good the old sayin', "Don't speak till you're spoke to." I haven't no patience with them newspapers, which all of 'em say as everybody's in the country, and that there's nobody left in London and such like, as I consider insulting to us that's compelled for to stay here, and as the Flanure in the Morning Star said only last week, as there was the Editor of the Times and MR. TOD-HEATLY (whoever can he be with such a funny name), and MR. TOM TAYLOR, and the Flanure hisself and a good many other important people still in London, so I says ditto to Mr. Flanure which wherever he can have got such a name from I can't make out, as always reminds me of underclothing, as we shall soon be wanting to take to again if the weather gets much cooler. But as I was a-sayin', however the papers can pretend as everybody is gone to the seaside-for I can tell you not even you ain't everybody, LETITIA-passes my judgment when there's no ockilar difference in the crowds of people in Cheapside, and when we know that not a sixth part of the people in our spere of life, nor yet a tenth of the lower orders, if even a twentieth, gets more than a breath of country for above a day or so from year's end to year's end, and what's more, don't want it; for, as I often say, there's nothink like London after all, as I'd rather stay at home with my comforts around me in the hot weather, than be stived up in a frumpy lodgin' by the seaside, where them as is used to a good bedstead that's reg'lar cleaned three times a year and not a vestige of a animalachi, can't get over the sort o' company as they find. Why, there's Southend, as the journey is certainly not dear at half-a-crown both ways. You never catch me a-goin' there to sit down on the grass in the orny mental garden again, which the grass is that invested in fleas, that your things is reg'lar lined with 'em. No, there's more stays in London by half than goes out of it; and though I hold with a change when you can get it comfortable, I don't see why you as goes away should give yourself such airs as to say you're everybody, but SAM says as that's what's called representation by the minority, and if it's got anythink to do

with politiks I think it's high time as the QUEEN come and looked into it, afore she goes away to France where I do hear she's invited next October. But law, there; if you're enjoying yourself at Margate, and I don't say but what the srimps is a pleasure, and so's the jetty when the wind ain't that high as gives you no control, I don't envy you, for me and SAM we've got High-park pretty well to ourselves now there ain't no rough meetings; and if September's the best month in the country it's a good deal better in London. Why, if you want fresh air, just go out for a stroll round St. Paul's Churchyard at about dusk and you'll have plenty of it I'll be bound, as well I know as have had that best umbrella o' mine torn to ribbons, as SAM and me was on our ways to the penny boat. Becos, don't you think us people here insinificant as they maybe don't take their pleasures; I can tell you I've been reg'lar holiday makin' ever since you left; and what should we do-me and SAM-the other evening but go for a escursion up the river. Such a splendid sight, and the water quite fresh to what it used to be, and the bridges and the grand public buildings beautiful on the shore, as is soon to be laid out as a promenard, all stone and marvellous. Well, we had such a tea at a place quite close to the Lowther Arcade by an Itallian name of GATTI, and then where do you think we went? Why, to the Covent Garden Theatre, whereThere, don't talk of no other concerts! Why, it was just the same as that night when we went to JULLIEN's when me and SAM was a-courtin', only there's two masters of the ceremonies now-nobody hasn't been able to support the fatigue as poor JULLIEN did, a-flourishing that stick about, and keeping the others up to the scratch-reg'lar slave-driving, I call it. But lor, they do play beautiful; and the place that full and yet not at all incommosive. The second conductor, one by the name of STRAWS-which what queer names these foreigners do give themselves-it's wonderful to see him, how he goes at it; and every now and then a-snatchin' up his fiddle and tearing away on it, to show the rest how to keep the pot a-bilin'. The singing, too, was beautiful, and the ladies-though perhaps they do dress that low as wouldn't suit the mother of a family-quite picters for the fashions, as I was obliged for to reg'lar drag SAM away when a young Spanish lady got up on the orkstrer; but let me tell you we didn't go till we'd had a somethink.

Yours,

MATILDA JANE TROTTLE.

London Printed by JUDD & GLASS, Phoenix Works, St. Andrew's Hill, Doctors' Commons, and Published (for the Proprietor) by W. ALDER, at 80, Feet-street, E.C.

September 14, 1867.

Bal

THE

TROUBADOUR.

TROUBADOUR he played
Without a castle wall,
Within, a hapless maid
Responded to his call.
"Oh, willow, woe is me!
Alack and well-a-day!
If I were only free

"And if you don't, my lord "He here stood bolt upright, And tapped a tailor's sword"Come out, you cad, and fight!"

I'd hie me far away!" Unknown her face and name, But this he knew right well, The maiden's wailing came From out a dungeon cell. A hapless woman lay

Within that dungeon grimThat fact, I've heard him say, Was quite enough for him.

"I will not sit or lie,

Or eat or drink, I vow, Till thou art free as I,

Or I as pent as thou!"

Her tears then ceased to flow,
Her wails no longer rang,
And tuneful in her woe

The prisoned maiden sang:

"Oh, stranger, as you play
I recognise your touch;
And all that I can say

Is thank you very much!"
He seized his clarion straight
And blew thereat, until
A warden oped the gate,

"Oh, what might be your will ?"

"I've come, sir knave, to see

The master of these halls:

A maid unwillingly

Lies prisoned in their walls."

With barely stifled sigh

That porter drooped his head, With teardrops in his eye,

"A many, sir," he said.

He stayed to hear no niore,

But pushed that porter by,

And shortly stood before

SIR HUGH DE PECKHAM RYE.

SIR HUGH he darkly frowned,

"What would you, sir, with me?" The troubadour he downed

Upon his bended knee.

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"They gets it precious hot,
The maidens wot we cotch-
Two years this lady's got
For collaring a wotch."

"Oh, ah!-indeed-I see " The troubadour exclaimed"If I may make so free,

How is this castle named ?" The warden's eyelids fill, And sighing, he replied, "Of gloomy Pentonville This is the Female Side!" The minstrel did not wait The warden stout to thank, But recollected straight

He'd business at the Bank!

MOTTO FOR THE LEADING JOURNAL.-Tempora mutantur.

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