Oh, list to this incredible tale Of THOMSON GREEN and HARRIET HALE, Its truth in one remark you'll sum "Twaddle twaddle twaddle twaddle twaddle twaddle twum." My name for truth is gone, I fear, But, monstrous as it may appear, To an eligible person in the cotton-broking way. His wife consulted DOCTOR CRICK, From whom some words like these would come Fiat mist. sumendum haustus, in a cochleyareum. For thirty years this curious pair Hung out in Canonbury-square, They loved each other dearly in a quiet sort of way. Well THOMSON GREEN fell ill and died To the eligible lodger in the cotton-broking way. Oh, list to this incredible tale Of THOMSON GREEN and HARRIET HALE, Its truth in one remark you'll sum"Twaddle twaddle twaddle twaddle twaddle twaddle twum!" That very self-same afternoon They started on their honeymoon, To a pretty little cottage close to Shanklin, Isle of Wight. Took a gentlemanly residence in Canonbury Square. They led a weird and reckless life, They dined each day, this man and wife, On a joint of meat, a pudding, and a little bit of cheese. In time came those maternal joys, A tiddy iddy daughter, and a tiddy iddy son! False Quantities-and False Arguments. We came upon a cutting in a newspaper the other day, attributed to the Rev. F. W. FARRAR. We do not know whence it is quoted, but it has such a semblance of truth that its error should be corrected at once. In speaking of classical knowledge the Reverend Gentleman says: "I cannot pretend to share in the traditional horror of a false quantity. I have long sincerely repented for having despised a Dissenting minister who talked to me as a boy about the 'gravammen,' of an offence. It is deplorable to hear a petty scholar triumphing with all the airs of conscious superiority over some very great man who has substituted a long for a short, or a short for a long. I cannot affect to think one atom the worse of Burke's imperial genius, because he said 'vectiggal' in the House of Commons." This looks all very well, MR. FARRAR, becomingly humble and modestminded, and FUN is with you to some extent. But was the Dissenting Minister compelled to use the word " gravamen,"-wasn't there an English word of corresponding meaning? Could not BURKE's imperial genius have been content to talk in its native tongue? The fact is, MR. FARRAR, that if it be snobbish to parade the classical knowledge one possesses, it is infinitely more snobbish to affect the classical knowledge one does not possess. BILL JONES is not expected to wear a gold watch-guard, but if he ostentatiously displays a plated article, it is kind-cruel, perhaps, but truly kind in those who detect the sham, to rebuke him for the attempted imposition. North and South. MR. MONCRIEFF, M.P. at the Burns Club Dinner at Edinburgh, the other day, asserted that modern English is a mere dialect or patois, and that Scotch is the true old language. "When the Norman invasion happened, the respectable people who spoke their language intelligently, retired from Middlesex, Kent, and Surrey, and left only the lowest of the community to teach the invaders their notions of English." Well! we never should suspect the Scotch of having been so retiring, but, at any rate when they come South now, not even a Norman invasion could prevail on them to turn North again. In Re Matilda. WHAT does it cost to make a whole family "as merry as grigs?" Ask RUSKIN-and go and do likewise. A FACT. Fussy and disagreeable old lady (coughing):-" OWнOO! Ow! Wow! Oн DEAR! I'M SURE YOU CAN'T BE IGNORANT, SIR, THAT SMOKING IS PROHIBITED. I MUST INSIST ON YOUR PUTTING OUT THAT CIGAR!" Fellow-traveller (coolly) :-"MY DEAR MADAM, THERE IS NOT THE SLIGHTEST CAUSE FOR ANY DISCOMFORT. THIS IS NOT A CIGAR-IT'S A TOOTHPICK! In Black and White. IN Aunt Judy's Magazine appear, from the pen of a negro boy aged ten, some short essays, which were sent from the Barbadoes to the Editor. In one of them we find it stated that the late Prince Consort "errected a Mossoleeum at Kenzington, London, for the grate MR. COAL, where you may Learn art and sighence, and Buy ginger Beer and bath Buns, which is a grate Blessing to the subjex of Her grashious Madjisty." We trust no one will ever again question the mental powers of the negro. This boy has described MR. COLE and his mission, "art, sighence, ginger Beer, and bath Buns," with an epigrammatic vigour that is quite surprising. It must be flattering to the autocrat of the Boilers to think that he is spoken of as "grate COAL" in the Barbadoes even, where, owing to the climate, fires and fuel are almost unknown. Lowering his Jib. THE humorist who described the horse banquet for the benefit of the readers of the Times, stated that the guests went through the bill of fare conscientiously, and that "there was very little gibbing." We presume he intended to say "jibbing," in facetious reference to a refractory quadruped; but a donkey even would know how to spell the word one would fancy. Perhaps he thought "gibbing" was more taking. A Disrespectator. THE Spectator on several occasions of late has done things which make people suspect that MRS. MALAPROP is a member of the staff, but perhaps the funniest thing which that witty journal has given us of late will be found in a paragraph relating to the Buckhurst Hill case. The Spectator says: "Matilda Griggs, labourer's daughter, was stabbed by a lover to whom she had borne a child in thirteen places" etc. Shade of ADDISON, is the revered title of Spectator to be allowed to a paper where such vulgar blunders flourish. 244 Town Talk. BY THE SAUNTERER IN SOCIETY.. D FUN. URING the last week we have no one ex peeted him to keep his word; and his "lectures," as he calls them, are eminently calculated to excite his hearers to riot. I should recommend his prompt expulsion from the country. It may seem to be honouring his blatant balderdash too highly to notice it at all; but in the disturbed state of Itish feeling just now, ignorant and intemperate rant even is dangerous, In a powder magazine, as much harm may be done by the unsavoury snuff of a farthing dip as by a veritable firebrand. THE American Magazines The Atlantic Monthly and Our Young Folks (MESSRS TRUBNER) are to hand, as they say in trade. In the former DICKENS gives us a very brief instalment off" George Silverman," while his "Holiday Romance" is absent from the latter, owing to a delay in the illustrating department,,, But in both cases the numbers are strong enough. I don't quite agree with the sweeping condemna tion which the author of "Does it pay to smoke?" passes on the kindly herb, but perhaps in America smoking, not to say chewing, is "The Characteristics of Genius" is an interesting carried to excess. paper. The children's magazine contains some capital matter-just the sort of thing for the young folks. It is to my mind the model of what such a magazine should be. IN the Times the other day there was a report of several deaths, produced by the bad water in a cistern. The gentleman who wrote the account mentioned that a pipe in the cistern communicated with the sewers, as if it were an exceptional thing. Why, every cistern has a waste pipe that communicates with the sewers and brings up foul gases which combine with the water, and are not to be removed by filtration! DR. LETHEBY, it is true, has lately declared that disease is not produced by drinking bad water, but then, as I have read in a late number of the Queen a notice of DR. LETHEBY'S "Cantor Lecture," I' don't feel inclined to think him a great authority. On the other hand PROFESSOR, FRANKLAND and other eminent men of science have pretty plainly proved the case against the water companies. PROFESSOR FRANKLAND reported the other day that in the districts whose supply is taken from the Thames the water was last month "totally unfit for domestic use." I can vouch for the truth of this myself, for I live under the benign sway of the Lambeth Waterworks and the fluid they have supplied me for some two months, and up to the present time, is a sort of skyblue, only the cloudy liquid is more noxious than London milk even. But even if one had good water supplied that would not remedy the gases from the waste-pipe. That evil must be met in other ways, the best to my knowledge being "Bishop's Sanitary Valve," which is as simple as it is efficacious. A hollow ball rests on the top of the waste pipe, connected by a rod with a valve. When the cistern is so full as to float this ball, the rod raises the valve and the water rushes down-and no gas can escape. I HAVE received the first number of the Illustrated Photographer, and a capital first number it is, though the illustrations are Graphotype. They are the best specimens of the process I have seen, but they show very clearly its faults and failures. The literary portion, though intended for the photographer, will be found interesting enough for the general public. DUMAS père has just started a new paper in Paris, which he names D'Artagnan, after the hero of his most popular novel. The Atlas has just taken a new lease of life, with a change of size and arrangement which is a decided improvement. MR. MYLES FENTON has been considerably chaffed for saying the other day that the servants of the Metropolitan Railway should attend 1 to the "Three S's"-Safety, Signals, and Civility. It has been LL HEAR HEAR!" "Dr. H. R. Smith, of Louisville, claims to have established the truth of the theory that animals found in the Mammoth Caves of Kentucky are not only without a trace of the optic nerve, but are also destitute of the sense of hearing." American Paper. IN old Kentucky's Mammoth Caves, All things that owe their birth and rearing Are born without the sense of hearing. And yet know raught at all about 'em, They rush in manner run-a-mucky, Sing CLARIBEL's unmeaning twaddle, Some youth attempts, less skilled than plucky, I wish I had in you been born,.. Oh, Mammoth Caverns of Kentucky!. And when my better-half begins my sins I love you well, my precious wife, In Mammoth Caverns of Kentucky! One's brains, until they drive one silly; How far beyond his fellows lucky, The Mammoth Caverns of Kentucky!" Tall Telegraphy. Ar the risk of being accused of cynicism, we will candidly expostulate with our clever contemporary, the Daily Telegraph, not on its being "impulsive," but on the peculiar tone of its impulsiveness. A that the quality "which little mortified by the sneers of the worldlings, the artless moralist of Peterborough Court, "thanks goodness the cynics call gushing' is not dead yet, or MATILDA GRIGGS might have rotted in Chelmsford gaol." Is it really cynical to protest against the false sentiment of such exaggerated phraseology as this? Rotting in Chelmsford gaol, forsooth! How long would a prisoner have to lie in a gaol ere he rot? Chelmsford must have been sadly overlooked by the inspectors of prisons if MISS GRIGGS, or any other captive there, has been in danger of incurring a disease which is mostly confined to sheep. It is the merest "rot" to rave and rant after the fashion sometimes affected by the Telegraph. A PUN, BY OUR PARISIAN. THE ROMAN QUESTION. Aspiring Amateur:-" HERE, I SAY, MOSES, I WANT A ROMAN DRESS TO PLAY BRUTUS IN!" Matter-of-fact Costumier :-" AHEM! DON'T YOU THINK YOU'D BETTER have a ROMAN NOSE AS WELL ?" THE SONG OF ST. STEPHEN'S. BY AN M.P. ONCE more we've come up for the Session, And politics prove a profession, While we slave upon stupid committees, Last year all was turned topsy-turvy, The squires thought their treatment was scurvy, But Dizzy has told us strange stories Since that, and in Edinburgh said It was just education the Tories Had need of, to go where he led. Again will the voice of the Speaker, Be heard 'mid the din of debate, When members once snubb'd have grown meeker And vanish'd to dinner at eight. And most men will follow their party, With faith that's unreasoning and hearty The boast of a British M.P. Our Dizzy will come with his figures, And GLADSTONE with classical sneers; And MILL who's such nuts upon niggers, And BRIGHT so disdainful of peers. Again will our OSBORNE be witty, And change in the face of the foe. Will tell of Hibernian wrongs; And the House, scarcely meaning to flatter, Again will each partisan journal And still in a dribble diurnal Will come all the chat of the clubs. Again will the lobby be busy, While WHITE sits serene at the door; 'Neath the reign of our DERBY and DIZZY The Session's upon us once more. 2 |