MORE BRIGHT IDEAS. CONSISTENT advo- MRS. SWANSDOWN'S WORK-TABLE. A CONVEYANCING LECTURE FOR THE LADIES. AND now, my dears, we approach the conclusion of our little illus- see. A steamer comes Now, as you may like to know the way in which MB. BUSTER'S earthly in from the United treasures were accumulated, I will show you a page or so from the States, a great ship bill against MRS. SWANSDOWN, which was regularly made up, every from Australia, mail from India and week, by a clerk kept for the purpose of attending to such matters. China, despatches and I will take out a leaf at random, there are already eighty or ninety correspondence from that unhappy region pages of the same kind. Any one is a good specimen. where four Christian nations are engaged in mutual slaughter, messages by telegraph from all the great capitals of Europe; all the tidings from all quarters of the Globe are gathered into that wonderful sheet, which, for one penny, is placed before you every day." The gentleman who praises that wonderful sheet, naturally also sympathises with Russia. Wonderful, indeed, are the contents of MR. BRIGHT'S penny sheet. They would be more wonderful still, if the vendor of that sheet to MR. BRIGHT had paid for them all. Perhaps he has, though. Make that reservation. Perhaps he maintains his own correspondent at New York, Geelong, Calcutta, Madras, Bombay, Canton, before Sebastopol, at Constantinople, in Paris, and every other capital in Europe, not excluding St. Petersburg, if he is a "friend' of MR. BRIGHT'S. Perhaps his foreign correspondence is all original. But, if otherwise, his news are simply prigged; and the patron of his paper is no better than a receiver of stolen goods. If MR. BRIGHT approves of this man's style of business, he cannot but approve likewise of Russian policy; nor ought it to surprise anybody to learn that he is accustomed to buy his silk pocket-handkerchiefs in the cheapest market, wherever that may be, which has succeeded Field Lane. MR. BRIGHT in the same speech, moreover, exhibited himself as a consistent professor of the doctrine of non-resistance at large. Against the national hostility to Russia, he contented himself with preferring the gentle plea, that Russia is not so barbarous as we generally suppose. He based this argument on two notable facts. These facts were, that Russia had at one extremity of the empire a library containing a great many books: and, at the other, a city containing an immense quantity of corn. MR. BRIGHT ignored, as usual, the real cause of the anti-Muscovite feeling of the people; namely, their conviction that the Russian attempt on Turkey was the first move towards the intended subjugation of Europe. He did not dispute that point; he only disputed the assertion, that the Russians were barbarians; and was satisfied to leave unprejudiced minds to draw the conclusion, that the Russian yoke was not so hard as it was supposed to be; and that, to take the chance of having to wear it, was preferable to fighting, in order to keep it off. It is very true that MR. BRIGHT predicts that "By-and-by we shall find out that CARDINAL WISEMAN, the French Invasion and the Russian Emperor may be classed in the same list of imaginary perils." MR. BRIGHT should speak for himself and his minority. They may laugh at the idea of foreign supremacy; for they would submit to it with smiles. Concordats and invasions are not imaginary eventualities; witness Austria and Turkey; though we may, perhaps, find them imaginary perils, if we persist in not being advised by MR. BRIGHT. A Frozen-Out Clock. We have seen with some surprise, but without much sympathy, an announcement that the clock of St. Paul's had been stopped by the excessive cold. We have no doubt that the case of the clock will occupy the immediate attention of the City authorities; and, as the cold has had the effect of stopping the hands, we should not be surprised if the Corporation should order that the hands be forthwith provided with a pair of gloves. If a muff would answer the purpose, perhaps the want might be supplied by a Common Councilman. 66 December 1 to 5. The purchaser having agreed to waive a commission into Confidential Clerk, at two ditto. Attending at an old farmhouse in Shropshire where the people had been Paid farmer's boy for opening gate and frightening away a hostile cow Having heard that there was a "LETTY" settled in Buckinghamshire, £ s. d. 15 15 0 12 12 0 10 6 4 0 13 4 0 10 0 006 068 220 0 0112 Journey into Hampshire, and attending several girls' schools, to ask if Attending a ladies' school at Brighton, and asking whether any of the A Quadrille having been of French extraction, and the Work-table having Copy evidence i had collected, to lay before MR. GRUBBY 0 13 4 0 68 006 008 068 068 068 0 13 4 050 0 13 4 068 1 3 6 34 0 13 4 110 . 20 10 0 This, my loves, is a specimen of the earthly treasures which MR. BUSTER found in MRS. SWANSDOWN's Work-table, and which every 'conveyancer" finds, in a greater or less degree, in every piece of You can understand, dears, how it is that counsel make money, and ground, or house, or cottage which he has to buy or sell for a client. bribe constituencies, and get into Parliament, and how solicitors drive broughams and drink champagne. If you have any doubt as to what I am telling you, or any suspicion that I am exaggerating, ask any country gentleman, with whom you may be spending your Christmas, whether his lawyers' bills for the year are unlike the above. He will find nothing to laugh at in the extract from MR. BUSTER'S account. But I am sorry to tell you, that MR. BUSTER'S accumulation of ANOTHER PAINFUL CASE OF DISTRESS.-The Parliamentary Re-earthly treasures-to say nothing of the smaller heap which the other porters of the morning papers have petitioned the Editor, "to be put three lawyers were making out of this Work-table job-was suddenly on the same footing as the Penny-a-Line." cut short by an accident, This accident, also, was the law's doing, and therefore the lawyers had no right to complain. By a recent Act, a convicted thief or other ruffian, if he can impose upon a gaol-chaplain and the other prison authorities (which is exceedingly easy), and can make them believe he means to amend, receives a Ticket-of-Leave, and A SOCIETY has lately sprung-or, we should rather say, tumbledis again let loose upon society. There are hundreds of these men at into existence at Paris, whose object is the accomplishment of what liberty, and in consequence, London is, just now, rather less safe than may be called the "disgusting feat" of eating horse-flesh. These init was in the days of HENRY THE EIGHTH. Well, while MR. BUSTER dividuals style themselves the "Hippophagic Association;" and the was arranging for "further exertions," three of these Ticket-of-Leave grand purpose of their lives seems to be, the getting down their throats gentlemen entered MRS. SWANSDOWN's house, with a false key, one as large a quantity of dead horses as possible. If these animals-we night, while the family were at the theatre. One man descended into mean the Society, not their food-are allowed to follow up their horrible the kitchen and soothed the servants into silence by means of a loaded plan, and satiate their appalling appetites, the question may arise,Where are we to get our cat's-meat?" Supposing the Society to conbludgeon and an empty pistol, and the others stripped the house. The silver-mounted Work-table was too large to carry away; but they sist of one hundred Members, and each Member were to moderate his smashed it to pieces with a hammer, and stripped off all its orna- hunger so as to eat only one horse per month, we get the frightful total ments, which, with a watch or two, some plate, miniatures, and other of six thousand horses annually withdrawn from the stock of the regular trifles, they removed to the house of another gentleman, of the dog's-meat man. It is true that many persons who frequent the cheap Hebrew persuasion who, though the Jews generally disclaim prose-shops, may be acting on hippophagic principles without being aware of restaurants in Paris, and, perhaps, even the lower order of London pielytism, speedily" converted", the plunder, with the aid of a melting-pot. it; but, that any human being can calmly sit down to a dinner off dead The police might have interposed, but were enjoying Christmas hospi- horse, is really inconceivable. If there is a body of epicures who have tality in a kitchen, four doors from MRS. SWANSDOWN'S. Here, of course, the negociations ended, as MR. FONDLESQUAW was carried gluttony to such a morbid pitch that they cannot eat wholesome not going to give his mother-in-law the épergne for nothing; and, both animal food, such as satisfies the rest of the human race, we would parties had to pay their lawyers' bills and dismiss the subject from direct their attention to a less valuable beast than the horse; and we their minds. If you, my dears, will do me the favour to observe the recommend them to that more congenial animal the ass, which would motto with which I have adorned these lectures, you will note that be very likely to agree with them. It may be said that the arrangeSHAKSPEARE saw little difference between a conveyancer and a thief, ment savours somewhat of cannibalism; but, if it should even be the and, perhaps, the SWANSDOWN and FONDLESQUAW families make less death of them, it would only make a still further diminution in the distinction than they should do between the Lawyers and the Ticket-of-number of donkeys. Leavers, who among them dealt with SEASONABLE GOOD-HUMOUR, A CUTLER, who has the reputation of being rather a sharp blade in his business, has stuck up in his shop-window-which is not a sixpenny fare from Oxford Street-the following announcement: We must not forget to mention, that just above the inscription is suspended a pair of Skates. Destitution of Brown Bess in Russia. WANT OF MILITARY INTELLIGENCE.-LORD LUCAN has received flints. Surely, if the heart of the CZAR is with his soldiers, the another Cavalry appointment. Shoe Black (who is doing a little "gratis" for a friend). "Well, afore I'd misdemean a feller creature like him, blow'd if I wouldn't a'most go and do-ay, hanythink." Sweeper. "Oh! ah! it's all very well for you, as has a good Bisness; but a poor Cove like me, doesn't know vot shifts he may be druv to." HABITS OF GREAT MEN. LORD ROBERT GROSVENOR stops all his watches and clocks on a MR. BRIGHT sleeps in a cotton nightcap. His socks, shirts, and sheets are likewise all of cotton. He carries his passion for cotton to such an excess, that, when he goes to an evening party, he will wear none but Berlin gloves. MR. FREDERICK PEEL insists upon his tailor always measuring him with red tape. SIR JAMES GRAHAM, when he receives a letter, cannot help peeping into it first. MR. GLADSTONE cannot eat a prawn without endeavouring to divide it into three heads. LORD JOHN talks of his children sometimes as Schedule A, B, C, &c. CHRISTMAS WAITS. We have been calling "Head Quarters" the "Horse Guards," quite long enough. It is high time that the Authorities of those Guards exchanged the name of that noble animal for the designation of another quadruped, to which they correspond, in nature and quality, a great deal more closely than they do to it. Henceforth, unless they show somewhat like-thanks to the Puseyites-will sign a Concordat with the POPE. reason to the contrary, they had better be denominated the Ass Guards. A New Kind; of Head Dress. Mistress. JANE, are you sure it was MRS. SMITHERS who called? Come, tell me now, how was she dressed ? Jane. Why, if you please, Mum, she was a-going to the Theayter, or a Ball, and she had on her 'ead a great big Turbot, Mum, and there was a Whale over that, Mum. THE KING OF PRUSSIA is waiting to see what turn events in Europe take, before he ventures to decide for one side or the other. Austria is also waiting to see which way the European cat jumps. CARDINAL WISEMAN is waiting for the happy day when England MR. COBDEN is waiting for the sheet of paper, by means of which he intends showing the way in which Russia should be crumpled up. England is waiting for the "Coming Man." A SENTIMENT FOR THE CENTRAL BOARD.-May all parochial heartburnings subside; and may there be an end to all anger-except D'IFF-ANGER (junior). |