TOWN TALK.

BY THE SAUNTERER IN SOCIETY.

SONG bills have already been introduced to the attention of the House, but I trust it will not be long before a bill is introduced to curtail the ex

cessive powers of the police. I have more than once drawn attention to the despotism of Might and Mayne, in defiance of Right, which rules in our streets after dark. But hitherto the tyrants have, at least, been in official garb, and if one got knocked about and half throttled one knew that it was by a regularly appointed guardian of the peace. Now things have gone a step farther, and if you or I, my dear reader, had happened to be a hardworking pianist returning home to Norwood after a long night's work, we might have been attacked by what was apparently a garotter, but turned out to be a police constable, and we should have been sent to Maidstone Prison, bail being refused, for defending life and property. This is worse than the police systems of France, Italy, or Spain, where there is no pretence of the liberty of the subject. Detectives in plain clothes may be very useful for certain specific purposes, but they must not assume the general functions of the police, unless the mouchard system is directly sanctioned by the House of Commons. It is high time Scotland-yard were reformed. The police have been over and over again proved to "get up" cases, to take upon themselves magisterial functions, to exceed their duty (at the Crystal Palace, for instance), and to be notoriously incapable of tracing out crimes (e.g., the St. Giles's murder, not to mention twenty others). The plain-clothes tyranny is, I hope, the last straw which will break the back, and destroy the patience, of that much-suffering camel, JOHN BULL.

I HAVE received a pamphlet in which MESSRS. MAW and PAYNE lay claim to the design adopted in the arrangement and classification of the coming French Exhibition. Of course, it is only a statement of one side of the case; but I must say they seem to have some grounds for their assertions. Perhaps the Parisians have made up their minds to avenge on the English nation the piracies of our dramatic authorsin which case we have no right to complain. Why it was only the other day that an adaptation of SCRIBE's Gardien was billed as "new and original"- -a dodge which has not even the charm of novelty, for has not MR. TOM TAYLOR Worked that oracle ever since he began as a playwright?

THE munificent and magnificent PEABODY, Sweet PEA-BODY-(Do not "the actions of the just smell sweet ?")-has added to his trust. An additional sum confided to the committee will enable them to prove yet further to JOHN BULL what can be done-and at no loss-to improve the condition of the poor. I hope the nation will profit by the example, and that it will copy this PEABODY rather than that other P-Body, the Parochial.

THE Pall Mall has its faults, which I have once or twice taken the liberty of pointing out. But it has surpassing merit, too, and in especial is remarkable for its able and severe literary criticism. Reviews, like dramatic notices, are, as a rule, utterly untrustworthy; and, therefore, any paper which boldly and honestly plies the scourge deserves the thanks of all who wish well to literature. The notice which more particularly suggests my remarks is "The Twaddling School of Essayists," in the Pall Mall of the 12th instant-a masterly bit of deserved flaying. There is a great deal too much twaddle going nowadays, and all credit is due to those who, utterly disregarding misrepresentation and howls, set themselves to remedy the evil.

THE British Institution is open, and is worse than usual this year, which is rather a feat! Of course there are a few good picturesthere must be when the catalogue includes works by MIGNOT, NIEMANN, LONG, GILBERT, HAYES, GOLDIE, BARNES, WALTON, YEAMES, and FITZGERALD. I must not forget a picture by young TOPHAM, too, which is full of promise. One or two foreigners distinguish themselves also-CHAIGNEAU, THOM (American by birth, French by training), and BOEHM:-I don't include MIGNOT in this category, as he has been working over here some time.

Ir is much to be regretted, I think, that people should select so sad a calamity as the loss of the London for the display of their bad taste. KING has been pounced on by photographers and managers in the

most unseemly way until a very proper and moderate protest has been wrung from the other survivors. The apppearance of KING on the boards of the Britannia and of DADDY at the Marylebone must be looked on as the result of the realism which is so fiercely studied on the stage nowadays. If the treadmill, why not the mutton-broth bath? If Pentonville, why not Lambeth? If convicts, why not paupers? All got up as much like the real thing as possible. This is art just as much as photography is.

I AM glad to see MR. SOTHERN is going to prosecute the libellers in the Spiritual Magazine. I hope the damages will be swingeing ones sufficient to close the career of that organ of a blasphemous and debasing imposture.

THE SURGEON'S REVENGE.

I LOVED her, and she knew it well;
She'd made a careful diagnosis,
And gave me, like a naughty belle,
Her smiles in very little doses.

I sent her notes and tender rhymes,
With bottles of her father's tonic;
And I had told her many times

I loved her-so the case was chronic.

She scorned me. I need hardly say

That oft in anguish I would leave her; My love would ebb and flow each day, A sort of intermittent fever.

I used all remedies I knew

Took stimulants, and then tried ices; But no refrigerants would do, The case was one eternal crisis.

I had a rival, woe is me,

The fact I must, perforce, acknowledge A Homoeopathist was he

A wretch who never passed the College.
And though I often called him quack,

He used to say how much I taught him;
But laughed at me behind my back,
With her, I know it, for I caught him.
We were good friends in outward guise,
For in the village we were fixtures;
And to such heights did friendship rise,
We even took each other's mixtures!
Of that arrangement I'd the best,

His globules were a harmless present;
But the poor fellow oft confest

My compounds were by no means pleasant.

We used to take long walks with her

We two who loved her to distraction-
And pleasant smiles her lips would stir,
To us 'twas hardly satisfaction.
When incompatibles agree,

And soda isn't riled by acid,
At that time-not till then-shall we
Agree to love her, and be placid!

So things went on, the end drew near,
They came one morn-her face was prouder;
He said in fun that he felt queer,

I rose and waved a Seidlitz Powder.

A powder wrapt in papers two

I gave him in the loved one's presence;
He took the white one, then the blue,
And died a death of effervescence!

Leaders-Ohne Worte.

A Wicked Attempt.

A

FROM OUR STALL.

LAST Wednesday deserves to be marked with chalk of the whitest

in the theatrical calendar. At no house in London could the critical playgoer have discovered the least ground for blame. No manager bullied the gentlemen in the stalls. No actor was imperfect in his part, so that even the Glowworm paled its intellectual fires, and admitted the impossibility of sharpening its arrows on Emery. There was not the slightest vulgarity apparent on that glorious evening in the dialogue of BELLINGHAM and BEST, not the slightest inefficiency in the stage management at the Adelphi. Neither Charles nor Joseph Surface made his appearance in an ebon moustache and lily-white wig. Not an actress winked at the side boxes, not a side box reciprocated. In fact, the impartial critic of stage plays and stage players who enriches the world through these pages, can point with unalloyed satisfaction to the brilliant evening of last Wednesday-Ash Wednesday, by the way-as a period of absolute perfection in dramatic

matters.

On Thursday night, however, our hope of a theatrical millennium was dispelled by the production of a very conventional and unexciting farce at the Haymarket. The notion is of the stalest, and the dialogue of the least brilliant. MISS ADA CAVENDISH, late of the Royalty Theatre, made her first appearance at this house in the character of the heroine, and was cordially received. The lady's acting would be much better if her self-possession were a little less. A certain soupçon of nervousness would have made her nearly perfect. MR. COMPTON was funny in a very un-funny character.

That lively play, The Stranger, by the late unlamented KOTZEBUE, has been attracting moderate audiences to Drury-lane for some nights past.

AN UMBRELLA-STAND AND DELIVER.

THIS is, perhaps, the coolest instance of advertising impudence we have ever come across :

TAKEN by MISTAKE on 12th Feb., from one of the carriages of the S.E. Railway, an UMBRELLA. The owner can have the same by describing it and paying for this advertisement. Apply at 54, Queen Anne-street, Cavendish-square.

A person takes an umbrella "by mistake" from a railway carriage, and will not give it up unless the owner pays five shillings for it. Moreover the advertiser says nothing about the umbrella that most people leave behind them when they take another "by mistake," so it is reasonable to suppose that he entered the carriage without one, and came away with one. Is the advertiser aware that he is open to a charge of wrongful possession if he refuses to give up the umbrella for nothing?

WANTED, A RAILWAY POET.

TRAVELLERS by the Underground Railway must have noticed with awe the promptness with which the company post up, in the most conspicuous part of their stations, the names of those who have been unhappy enough to offend against their bye-laws, with the full particulars of the crime in each case, and its appalling punishment. There is a terrible significance in these terse records. Weak, underground humanity, which has escaped this awful penalty, reads and trembles, and thanks its stars that Fate, overruling its proclivities, never permitted it to jump out of a train in motion, or assault the company's servants, or forget to take its ticket. Fancy being placarded-up in that way! Imagine the consternation, not unmixed with morbid curiosity, with which his friends would regard the man who had passed through the phase of being ". a caution " But the company are certainly at fault in one point. The "cautions" are, if anything, too dry and matter-of-fact. They do not seem to possess that thrilling interest that crime-which has been shown to be capable of 'immense sensational development-ought to possess. Few people read 'them; and those who do read, do so, we fear, not in the pure spirit of intellectual enthusiasm we should expect, but rather because they have to wait for a train, and have exhausted all the "flamers," and are tired of watching the flirtations of the young ladies behind the refreshment counters. We have a suggestion to offer. It is evident these notices will do little good unless they are more generally read. Why not introduce the sensational element into them? Does not the million delight in versification? See what the mighty Moses has achieved with verse. Let the Metropolitan Railway Company boldly

follow his example, and KEEP A POET. Give him to understand that his principal duties will be "pointing morals," and "adorning tales." Let them lose no time, but advertise at once: Salary, £100 a-year, and the poet's beer. N.B.-No one of the name of TUPPER need apply."

We can imagine the difficulty of preserving order among the dense crowds that would constantly surround the subjoined specimens:

Conviction

CASE 1.

of JOHN STUBBS, Poet, for defacing the interior of one of the Metropolitan Railway Company's Carriages.

Bleak was the night: low fall'n the glass;
The poet took the train-third-class

(King's-cross to Notting-hill)—

He did not dare to walk so far
On such an eve, for dire catarrh

Had made him rather ill.
He sighed, as on the hard, cold seat
He cast his weary form: his feet
Uncomfortably damp-

Roman his nose: his eye deep blue:
Complexion rather bad, 'tis true
('Twas thought that cast that pallid hue,
And not our new gas lamp).
What noble thoughts pervade his breast,
And leave him not a moment's rest!
See, see he writes them all!
Ah, no! The words seem all the same--
'Tis but one dear, repeated name

He scratches on the wall:-
"Eliza Jane "with deep-drawn sigh-
Nor heeds he how the moments fly,

But scrawls" ELIZA JANE."
The train is stopping-neck and heels
Sudden himself pulled out he feels,

With breathless sense of pain.
Next day, before the awful face
Of MUGGINS, Alderman, his case

Was brought-on, number one. His worship said, and justly, too, ""Tis right such vagabonds as you

Should pay for what they've done; These tricks won't suit a public line, I'll, therefore, give the utmost fine,

Five pounds, or forty days!

A name so vulgar, too! Scarce meet
To shout along the public street."

(His worship scorns to praise.)
"What's in a name?" the bard cried out;
His worship felt 'twas right to scout
Such interruption rude;

And sentenced him, in sternest sort,
For such supreme contempt of Court,
To penal servitude!

At treadmill, now, the poet grinds,
His hair is cut, his health he finds
Improving, past a question;
But one small drawback still he feels,
Working directly after meals

Tends to give indigestion!

It might be advisable to have a caution of this kind posted up occasionally for the benefit of snappish and intellectual minds:CASE 2.

Conviction of JOSEPH PAYNE, Prize-fighter, for alighting from the Metropolitan Railway Company's carriage while in motion.

Enormous JOE PAYNE
Leaping out of a train

In motion, at Paddington station,
Was taken at once

Before Magistrate DUNCE,

Who fined him, with this observation:-
"Had you slipp'd 'neath the wheel,
When you turned on your heel,
Seeking after 'saltatory' glory,
In a railway embrace

You'd soon find it a case

Of 'neck)-sine magno dolore.'"

With this last we leave our suggestion in the hands of the Metropolitan Railway Company. A nod is as good as a wink to a certain noble quadruped whose visual organs are defective.

FAIR ENOUGH.

THE EMPEROR OF THE FRENCH has requested MR. FRAIL, of Shrewsbury, to become manager of the Versailles race-course. This is a high compliment, for though the fair are sometimes frail, the FRAIL are not always fair.

MEATING THE DIFFICULTY.

[Excruciating delight of hunting gent.

A WAKE! ARISE!

THE Captain of the Bulldog is too wide awake to accept the sword of honour, to present him with which a subscription has been started. He very rightly says that to take it under the circumstances would be against the rules of the service. But this only proves the more that he's an honourable blade. The Admiralty, which with its usual wisdom deprived him of the command of a ship that no longer existed, should in recognition of this submission give him a new command, and so make up to him for the loss. Meanwhile, subscribers need not mourn the sword CAPTAIN WAKE wears will always be a sword of honour!

EPIGRAM.

PICKED UP NEAR WHITEHALL.

THOSE who steamships build of REED,

And quite sea-worthy think 'em, Should hardly be surprised, indeed,

To find that COLES would sink 'em.

Extraordinary Mildness of the Season.

MR. and MRS. HENPEKT have been observed at the theatre together, and it is reported that MRS. H. called her husband "dear," and only contradicted him once.

MR. HEKTOR, during the last week, has only sworn at the clubwaiter three times.

MR. SKINFLINT was noticed taking his wife out for a walk, and we have it on undoubted authority that he of his own accord bought her a new bonnet.

UNSUITABLE.

Ir is very odd that MR. BRIGHT should select the occasion of the opening of Parliament to talk about its clothes.