POTSDAMICUS. 1,000TH PERFORMANCE. G. C. P. addresses His Parliament. Reichstag! Preparatory to a shock I now declare the session opened! Hoch Here in my red right hand I hold a schem For fortifying my superb régime:To execute a Navy, large and fine, Worthy your Lord and his tremendous line In pure formality I ask the nation To vote a thousand million marks. [Sensation Our noble army, you will understand, Is limited to exercise on land; And we have lately planted overseas Upon official maps I rather hope You may remark them with a microscope. To hold the highways thither nice and fre For fruits of German ingenuity, To make our name, the Fatherland's and Mine, A holy terror on the heaving brine Where now we roll in antiquated arksFor this I want the paltry billion marks. Two cruisers, you remember, went to I will not say the things were obsolete, His slighted honour naturally burns taels, With local rights for laying German rails, Extinction of the conscious Mandarin, An open port for hibernating in, Two halters for the guilty when detected, And one memorial Dom to be erected. Supposing now that we were forced to wreak This kind of vengeance every other week; Or say to keep within the bounds of reason They slew a brace of Teutons every season; Activity upon a noble scale. And since, again, the overlandish route Is fraught with peril both from man and brute, Our safest course, for this and other trips, Is to construct a lot of costly ships. O Reichstag! standing on this sacred floor Two years ago I positively swore To keep, if needful, with my blood and blade, The realm my fathers gave me ready-made. I yield the deadlier duties to another, Is relatively light. You pay the bill. Noble Amateur (to Model). "Do YOU EVER SIT TO ORDINARY ARTISTS?" "The Polite Letter-Writer." A NEW manual of the Epistolary Art, showing how to conduct a political correspondence with courtesy, dignity, and good taste. By W. V. H-RC-RT and J-s-PH CH-MB-RL-N. THE HUMMING PEST. And that's the humming pest. He's humming when he meets you. Self-satisfied he rolls his eyes, And clears his beefy throat, You learn-you would not otherwiseThat he's a man "of note." No use, on seeing him, to fly, He constantly defeats you, He will not let you pass him byHe's humming when he meets you. However fine may be the voice I hate his humming "pose." Some WAGNER leit motif, To some of his confounded "airs" ANSWERS TO CORRESPONDENTS. ARTFUL.-We think your scheme for obtaining an appointment ingenious, though a trifle risky. The appointment you probably would get is one for seven years— in the stone-quarrying line, on the Dorset coast. Mr. Popham. "OH, THIS ONE IS LOVELY ! I WONDER WHAT SHE WOULD DO, IF I WERE TO PROPOSE FOR THE ORIGINAL?" OUR BOOKING-OFFICE. most farces, and in bills of the play at Christmas-time, when, in order to swell the cast, the manager was wont to bestow humorous names on a variety of supers" and small people, who were paid to be seen, but on no account to be heard, except collectively. 66 The World gives a fully-illustrated Christmas Number, containing two large pictures by Mr. BRYAN, crammed full of a lot of persons representing, as usual, celebrities," who, on this occasion, have not the air of appearing in the least at home." The double illustration is accompanied by a list of these eminent individuals; but it would have been more in keeping with Christmas-time to have issued it as a sort of "puzzle-picture," and to have offered a prize to anyone who should guess correctly the names of all the more-or-less celebrated individuals whose likenesses the artist had intended to represent. Jorrocks, M.F.H., who was the Pickwick of the hunting field, and the delightfully-original Soapy Sponge, both inimitably illustrated by JOHN LEECH, are a couple of sporting stories ditticult to rival and hard to beat. Mr. Fox RUSSELL, however-the author's name has a decidedly sporting smack about it-comes forward with The Haughtyshire Hunt (BRADBURY, AGNEW, & Co.), a lively sporting story whose hero is nearer akin to Jorrocks than any character the Baron remembers to have seen in sporting fiction. And Mr. RUSSELL has had the good luck to be associated with Mr. R. J. RICHARDSON, whose method of illustration is entirely his own, whose accurately-drawn horses and riders in action are "full of go," but whose figures and situations are somewhat lacking in the quality of humour. That the "toned" page illustrations lose in effect as much as those in the Jorrocks and Soapy Sponge As to the cards which Father Christmas leaves on us when series gain by their colour, will, the Baron thinks, be the opinion of he calls, there is quite an old-fashioned cheeriness of colour all who have the facilities at hand for making the comparison. Artis-about MARCUS WARD & Co.'s Christmas cards, and if it is tically, the majority of the drawings, even where they are somewhat humour you want," as Mr. BRANDON THOMAS used to say in The hard, are admirable; while not a few of the single figures, as, for Pantomime Rehearsal, it is provided in the liveliest variainstance, that of Will the huntsman, are, from every point of view, tions. The calendars and almanacs tell the coming year in the except the humorous, perfect. The sporting adventures of Mr. most artistic surroundings. Messrs. C. W. FAULKNER & Co.'s Travers Algernon Binkie, from his first day's run with the Duke's cards take Christmas a little more seriously in their exquisite hounds, when he is mounted on Marmion, to his steeplechase platinotypes, of which some are worthy of a frame, and their on The Roman, when Marmion, with Ronald Dennison up, wins, calendars, especially "The Minuet " series, make the days dance are genuinely amusing; while the scene in the Law Courts is a in the "daintiest" possible fashion. If you ask this Firm," What's capital climax to the story. In his next sporting novel, the Baron your little game at Christmas?" they will reply, "Oh, ever so many trusts that Mr. Fox RUSSELL will carefully avoid the very old- novelties, including Association Football,' intended for drawfashioned descriptive nomenclature which he has adopted for his ing-room amusement!" As this announcement will startle characters, as, for example, "Haughtyshire," Fitzsquander," grandmammas and domesticated elderly aunts, it is as well to "Farmer Wintercabbage," "Karl Krack whipz," "Rev. Geoffry explain that it is only a drawing-table edition of "Socker," ""Lord Gravity," Jawbrother," Miss Lumpkin," which are of that's all. the kind that, in bygone days, were to be found in some comedies, 66 66 "It is now some 'sixty years since' Pickwick was published," writes the indefatigable and undefeated Dickensian student, Mr. PERCY FITZGERALD, in his latest book, entitled Pickwickian Manners and Customs (Roxburghe Press, Limited), "and it is still heartily appreciated." True: it is "still heartily appreciated" by those who enjoyed Pickwick when they were boys together; the girls never cared for it; but among those of a later time, dating, say, even so far back as the sixties, how many are there who care about Pickwick? while among those whose existence dates from 1878, for example, the Baron questions whether Mr. FITZGERALD will find one in thirty who may have tried to read Pickwick and failed, and not one in fifty who have "heartily appreciated" the immortal work. But, be this as it may, Mr. PEROY FITZGERALD's book on Pickwickian Manners and Customs will prove attractive and interesting to all who love their Pickwick. He has started a theory, no less plausible than ingenious, as to the probability that BOSWELL'S Life of Johnson to a certain extent inspired DICKENS in the creation of Mr. Pickwick and his followers. To the Baron's thinking, Mr. FITZGERALD'S chapter on "Boz" and Bozzy proves this beyond the possibility of doubt. The thanks of all genuine Pickwickians are due to Mr. FITZGERALD for this notable addition to the "Boz" classics. My Baronitess informs me that Wild Kitty, by L. T. MEADE (W. AND R. CHAMBERS), is a capital book for schoolgirls. Kitty leaves the "ould counthry" to be educated in a select Englis school. The primness of the genteel Briton proves upsetting to the Hibernian temperament, and this young lady, from a castle, apparently in the backwoods, gets into many a scrape. The "Hoorush!" and the 66 'shillelagh" are, however, actually not among her accomplishments! Elsie's Magician, by FRED WHISHAW, with many effective illustrations by LEWIS BAUMER (W. AND R. CHAMBERS), has no dealings in "magic and spells," but is a genuine golden man, who eventually discovers himself at the correct moment as the longlost grandfather-"Which his name it was WALKER!" Good name for a wandering grand-parent. Princess Sarah, and Other Tales, by JOHN STRANGE WINTER (WARD, LOCK & Co.), may possibly prove entertaining to the ordinary "maid of bashful fifteen," except that, perhaps, nowadays, observes my Baronitess, "bashful fifteen " is extraordinary, for whom something stronger and more exciting may be required. The stories are rather commonplace, which is Strange for JOHN WINTER. By the author of Tatterley," set forth on the cover of a new book, is a phrase to conjure with. In A Prince of Mischance (HUTCHINSON), Mr. TOM GALLON has broken fresh ground. The household in the Professor's home by the seaside is full of living people, the Professor being a delightfully original person from whose company we part all too soon. All the characters in the story stand firmly forth, interest culminating in Evelyn. It would not be fair even to hint at the lines of her story, or the finely-conceived tragedy in which it closes. Readers of Tatterley will find no disappointment in making the acquaintance of the author's new essay. THE BARON DE B.-W. Ir would be a pity not to rescue from oblivion such a delightful advertisement as the following, which appears in the Church "WANTED, two Ladies as COOK and HOUSEMAID, to share entire work of North Country Seaside Vicarage. Two children and resident governess. If salary required by both, state amount. Organ desirable in one." AN ACKNOWLEDGMENT AND A MYSTERY.-A Bottle of "Stick-Times: phast Paste" in magnificent morocco-leather case. "We saw it for a moment, but we think we see it now "-only we don't at this minute. One of the youngest and wisest of our office boys, since lost to sight, but to memory dear, was, it is reported, heard to declare, concerning the aforesaid paste, that "it was uncommon good if you were very hungry," and if, like the Marchioness, "you made believe very much." Neither that youngest and wisest official, nor the stickphast paste, has ever been seen again. But we must not conclude from this that the lad is a thorough-paste young rascal. DECIDEDLY EXAGGERATED.-Lord BALFOUR O' Burleigh, in his speech at Glasgow, "offered Sir WILLIAM HARCOURT his humble congratulations on his having at last found a platform upon which he could stand," &c., &c. No! no! Sir WILLIAM is not so mightily heavy as to find any difficulty in getting the support of an ordinary platform of fairly liberal dimensions. Sir WILLIAM is big, but he is not burly. GOOD OMEN FOR THE LONDON SCHOOL BOARD.-That this body should now be illumined by a Reay of light-and leading. Surely no lady would require a salary for the privilege of 'sharing" the household duties in this charming retreat. An occasional peep at the Bass Rock or Flamborough Head would be ample remuneration combined with the delights of playing the organ gratis, and possibly managing a choir, and feeling that, after all, one was of some use in the world. Perhaps an aggrieved baronet, or even a needy viscount, might be induced to officiate as gardener-coachman for a similarly nominal salary in this philanthropic establishment. The wonder is, that persons in menial situations continue any longer to accept "wages as well as hospitality in return for their services. Any rightminded lady or nobleman could only construe such a pecuniary offer as an insult to their birth and breeding. And in the beautiful new century that is now approaching, we expect that individuals of whatever rank, even generals," with any spark of gratitude and good feeling, will pay their mistresses a handsome premium, in addition to an annual fee, for the comfort, experience, distinction, and company of two children and a resident governess obtainable in quiet north-country seaside homes. What offers, ladies ? WANTED!-Strong man as President of the Reichsrath. Exprize-fighter or chucker-out preferred. Good social position and salary. Permanency to suitable man. Must be used to AT URUGUAY." An ex-policeman" attempted to stab the black eyes. Doctors and raw beef supplied. Apply, stating President. Providentially his design was frustrated. "An exqualifications, number of men knocked out, &c., &c., to Chief policeman!" Ah! THACKERAY'S "Policeman X." would never Clerk, Reichsrath, Vienna. have behaved in so dastardly a manner. First Actress. "OH, MY DEAR, I'M FEELING SO CHIPPY! I THINK I SHALL SEND DOWN A DOCTOR'S CERTIFICATE TO-NIGHT, TO SAY I CAN'T ACT.' Second Ditto. "SURELY A CERTIFICATE ISN'T NECESSARY, DEAR?" TO THE CREW OF THE MARGATE SURF-BOAT, "FRIEND TO ALL NATIONS." ALL night the pitiless blast had swept Then, as the cry for rescue rang, With quick farewell to child and wife To yield their lives for the stranger life. Friend to all Nations! Friend at need, Stout hearts of Kent, that heard the call These bodies dank with the salt sea's breath? That wait till the sea gives up its dead! APPROPRIATE ETON BOAT-SONG (as duet) FOR THE CHRISTMAS CRACKER SEASON.-Pull, Pull Together! with our compliments to the famed cracker-purveyors, Messrs. SPARAGNAPANE & Co. RETAINED FOR THE DEFENCE. ["Ladies are being enrolled as hon. members of a Volunteer Corps in Devonshire."-Daily Paper.] "AND so it was at Exeter that the first of us were enrolled as honorary members," said the Major, looking into the glass and arranging a refractory curl. "Yes," returned the senior Captain, "and since then we have grown apace. Battalions all over the country, and a fair force of artillery." "Yes," assented a Subaltern. "Actually that branch of the service became very popular on the introduction of noiseless powder." "Talking of noise," said the Colonel, "don't you think we could substitute a cottage for the grand piano in the orchestra?" "Afraid not," replied the chief of the Band Committee, "for we want something strong in strings to go with the harps." "Dear me!" exclaimed the chief, looking at the clock. "It's time for parade. We must have missed the bugle call." "Yes, Ma'am, all our buglers are rather feeble in sounding. They cannot compare with our brothers of the line." "Then, ladies, fall in." "Which is better than falling out," whispered the regimental wag. And a few moments later the members of the Amazon Rifle Volunteers appeared on parade. "Hem!" commented the male military critic. "Smart! but what would they do in time of war?" Then, on consideration he added, "It should be sine quâ non that only single recruit should be eligible, and they must have come safely out of at least two engagements." |