Single-handed?" he asks, fixing his gaze on the button where he had previously been so successful.

"I don't quite understand," I say.

His eye wanders, and he speaks very carefully, as if weighing every word, and finding them all uncommonly heavy.

66

"here

My meaning is-as do you keep another man-orvagueness seems to seize him suddenly, but he tries my top button again, and finishes with-" or all this-for-one ?" Then he frowns. "For one," I answer.

He won't let that top button out of his sight for an instant now. "With occashnal 'elp?" he asks; then adds, while allowing his features to relax into what he intends to be a persuasive smile, You'd have occashnal 'elp, I s'pose, Sir. Cos you see, Sir," he goes on, his tone becoming almost pathetic, "a pig, a cow, a pony, and what not besides, is more than one man's time singl'anded.

66

On deliberation, I concede a boy now and then. He shakes his head over it. "Very sorry, but he don't think as it'll do, and he don't think as I'll get anyone, who ain't not quite starving, for such work as this."

He is suddenly changing his manner into one of impertinence. It breaks upon me all at once-of drunken impertinence.

This decides me. He may withdraw. He lingers. He ought, he says, to have his expenses for coming up on such a fool's errand. I can't hear of such a thing.

"Can't hear ?" he suddenly exclaims, becoming quite violent and offensive, "Who's you, to send for poor 'ard-workin' men up 'ere, trepannin' them up for nothing? Darn you an' your pigs and your Cows! Why, I'd be above offrin' a respekable man such a place as yourn, and if there's law in this land, I'll

Here a decent-lookin' woman rushes into the room, and seizes him. "JOHN," she says, "you're spoilin' your chances; don't be

66

a fool." He looks sullenly at her, as if he 'd like to argue this p But she continues to me: He took something next door, beir temperans gen'ally, as went against him, and he ain't quite his just now."

Fortunately, she is able, with the assistance of a friend or outside, to get him away before he is less and less himself, as h every moment becoming, and so rapidly that who he'll be when reaches the front door, and gets out into the cold air, it will be di cult to determine.

Examination continues.

WHEN a goose who is heir to a title and lands, wants to raise wind,

And promises sixty per cent. to the Jews-query, should not t promise bind P

To teach vicious geese of the same breed, who under Jews' cla have smarted,

That

On

young idiots who go that road and their money will soon parted.

the whole, Punch would say, that as vultures who prey garbage keep down

The pestilent breath of way-side death that else would poison t town, So those who lend at sixty per cent. are Society's scavenger vulture Who keep down the plagues that in folly and vice of young spend thrifts find their cultures.

And as carrion-vultures, in the East, though foul, protection hav got,

'Twere well if young gentlemen who fire at our vultures should b made to pay their shot.

"HEAVY WET."-The Present Season.

PEOPLE YOU OBJECT TO MEET.

MR. WHINER, who never sees you without saying how very fat you've grown, or how very pale you look.

MR. HUMDRUM, who, when in society, confines his conversation to the changes of the weather and the rising price of coals. LADY DAWDDLER, who, if you meet her in the Park, is pretty sure to ask you to carry her fat lap-dog for her.

MR, QUAVER, who raves about the music of the future, and never says a word of sense about the music of the present.

CAPTAIN BLUSTERHAM, who bellows out your name when he meets you in the street, and shakes you by the hand till he nearly wrings your fingers off.

MR. WHEEZER, who fancies that he is an invalid, and explains to the symptoms of his latest ailment.

you

MR. HARDUPPE, who, upon the strength of old school fellowship, will never miss a chance of borrowing half a sov. of you.

MR. BORER, who even now discusses the merits of the Tichborne

case.

MESSES. SAWBONES and PILGARLIC, who, when they happen to meet at dinner, invariably talk shop together, and take away your appetite.

MR. JEREMIAH DOLDRUMS, who thinks he has a grievance against one of your best friends, and takes you by the button-hole in order to explain it.

BARON MUNCHAUSEN, Junior, who once was captured by the brigands, and every time he sees you embellishes the incident. MR. and MRS. CADGER, who, if you invite them for a day or two, always come provided with luggage for a fortnight.

Gentlemen at Large.

Jim. BILL, I say, show us the Skeleton in your Cupboard. Bill. I ain't a got no skellinton in ne'er a cupboard, but (indicating his waistcoat-pocket with his thumb), 'ere's a bunch of skellinton-keys!

LINES BY A LOVER.

WOULD you then know my CELIA's charms?
She carries pug-dogs in her arms:
E'er dresses in the newest taste,
By lacing tight deforms her waist,
Bears on her head a brigand's hat,
Gay feathers flaunting high on that:
Her hair is only half her own,
The other half elsewhere has grown:
Her cheeks a dab of rouge reveal,
Her boots three inches high of heel:
Her fingers are bedecked with rings
As paltry as the songs she sings:
Her talk is slang, she votes men slow
Unless a thing or two they know

She loves champagne, detests cold mutton,
Knows barely how to fix a button:

Will wager gloves in racing bets,

But, having lost, to pay forgets:

In dancing she can twist and twirl

As deftly as a ballet-girl.

Yet ne'er has learned with grace to walk, But struts with an audacious stalk.

She treats her servant like a slave;

She spends, but ne'er has learned to save:
Loves shopping, bonnets, and bazaars;
Can skate, ride, row, and smoke cigars:
Reads trashy novels by the score,
But votes all better books a bore:
Will flirt with whomsoe'er she can-
O, am not I a happy man!

Defamation of Character.

IT is a long time since the Chaldean monarch, noticed by MR. GEORGE SMITH in his admirable paper on a remarkable Cuneiform Inscription, lived, but for all that due respect ought to be paid to his memory. We were sorry, therefore, to read in the newspaper a statement for which there does not appear to be the slightest foundation, that IZDUBAR "in his search for immorality had learnt the legend of the Deluge from SISIT." We hope MR. SMITH, or SIR HENRY RAWLINSON, or some other friend of KING IZDUBAR, will at once give so injurious an imputation the fullest contradiction."

made

We can't have the springs of order and light, of a sudden, the levers
Wherewith to screw up wages, or adjust troubles of trade.
And any Union that tries this on Disunion will bring about
Betwixt the public that suffers, and the workmen that turn out.
The Stokers on strike the Marseillaise may sing in Trafalgar Square,
But till they make a better case for their sudden and strange
out-flare,

They'll find folks disposed to treat their tall talk as gas of very bad And to retort on their prayer for support with cold-shouldered inhospitality.

If there's tyranny in masters, there's tyranny in men;
We've learnt the lesson before, and now seem like to learn it again;
But of all the strikes, ill-stricken, that ever Punch did see,
This strike of the Stokers seems the worst, on all accounts, to be!

Better Conduct.

It is a long lane that has no turning. The most hardened offender may reform. Wonders will never cease. Somebody is not so black as he is depicted. Strikes may come to an end, coals and meat may become reasonable in price, the rain may stop, MR. AYRTON may grow polite, next May may be warm-for November has passed and gone without a fog!

99

A BIRTHDAY IN DECEMBER.

MDCCXCV.

YE Ministers of all denominations,
Including you, my Masters, named of State,
Whose chief end, in discourses and orations,
Is truth, the thing that is, to inculcate;
All you, besides, who Cant hold in aversion,
Evasions hate, and platitudes contemn,
And vote that stern and resolute coercion
The rising tide of Anarchy should stem:
Ye who do phantasms, quacks, and shams detest,
And humbug execrate in all its shapes,
Drink we to him who hath essayed his best

Mud Pythons all to squelch, and Dead Sea Apes.

Philosopher, Historian, Joker see,

Who doth, his living peer? Unto the brim Fill, and, for choice, the stoup with barley-bree, For Caledonia did engender him:

True THOMAS, though no Rhymer, Chelsea's Sage,
The fourth of this month was his natal day.
Many returns thereof augment his age.
THOMAS CARLYLE! His good health.
Hooray!

His Likeness.

Pros't.

THE many readers of Middlemarch-unfortunately this is not the time for taking the periodical census, or some information might have been obtained as to their total number-may be glad to be told that there is now to be seen, at the Kensington Museum, a miniature portrait of CASAUBON.

PUNCH'S POCKET-BOOK.

WE have been favoured with an early copy of this extraordin work, and we do not feel that we have received any favour at though doubtless the gift was prompted by the best intentions. examination of the work has entirely disturbed our system, caused us to neglect our daily duties. When we state that volume is adorned with a superb plate called "Science in her Si Slippers," by the indomitable KEENE, with a series of miniature toons, by the inexpugnable TENNIEL, with a mass of comic inspirati by the inextinguishable SAMBOURNE, and with a wealth of fairygems of initials by other accomplished parties, we shall be thou to have said enough. But we do not, ourselves, share in the thoug and when we proceed to mention that there is a mass of literat composed of the choicest specimens of graceful yet mordant sat of lyrics in which the playful maintains successful grapple with ferocious, of a Very Last Idyll which must have been written the Poet-Laureate, or by some one else, of a Court novel which w excite, it may be, no small indignation, and of a perfect Instructor all foreign languages, which will enable the feeblest linguist talk like a GOETHE or a LAMARTINE, we find that we have only h exhausted the catalogue of artistic and literary treasures to found under the brilliantly coloured binding of this most exquis of all Christmas books. But that we hate puffing, and rather pref to understate the merits of a work than to bestow on it the slighte exaggerated praise, we could say much more, but though he w dares more than may become a man is none, he who doth not lay h hand upon this book in the way of kindness, and give it to ever woman he knows, is a wretch whom it were base flattery to call a awful idiot.

CAUTION TO JOURNALISTS.

To call a spade a spade may or may not be libellous; but it a libel to call the Knave of Spades a knave. A British Judge woul no doubt also rule that it was libellous to call a Rake a Rake.

PLACETS AND NON-PLACETS.

In Re DEAN STANLEY at Oxford.

THAT Oxford still should bring forth broods
Of the old Obscurantist strain,
The scarlet of whose Doctors' hoods
Is of the Babylonian grain,-

Who hold that light but serves to blind;
And reason but to lead astray,
And deem it cruel to be kind

To those who walk a wider way
Than the strait road, high dogma-railed,
Along whose marge, if they were able,
They'd string up heresies, impaled

Like vermin on a Keeper's gable-
That of all plans, on which impacted,
Truth's light is variously refracted,
This should be still an Oxford facet,
And such a large one too,-NON-PLACET!
That, braving shock and counter-shock,
Oxford has trained a growing band,
Who hold that Truth is based on rock,
And Orthodoxy but on sand-
Believe that Churchmanship, though broad,
Sincere and strong and sound can be,
That who live Christian life unflawed,
Are like most Christian light to see-
That to love others, not to judge,
Is the true Christian's truest part,

Freely of light to give, not grudge,

What most draws Christian heart to heart:That he whose life, books, sermons still, Have shown this faith in work, word, will, St. Mary's pulpit mounts, to grace it

With the Broad Church's Colours-PLACET!

That Charity lukewarm or worse

To BURGON and his kin should seem,Faith without flavour of a curse

To GOULBURN but a hazy dream:That a Church without power to ban, No counter-power to bless can own; Nor Christ's seed sprout in soul of man, Unless gall-watered when 'tis sown.That what most worthy love appears

To simple folks, these guides eschew; What most sets Christians by the ears,

That most they and their Church pursue';-
That, while the Sermon on the Mount
Stands as Christ's word of chief account,
The hands that seem the first to efface it,
Should be styled Orthodox, NON-PLACETI

But that the Broad Church should have laid
Its basement walls so deep and wide,
That to her, ev'n in Oxford, aid

In stress of need is quick supplied-
That, when the bigot's blast is blown,
Even though" STANLEY!" is the cry,
And Heresy's red cross has flown

Through cleric England, hot and high, They who put trust in truth o'erpower Those whom the name of truth appals, Till Obscurantism's soldiers cower,

Beaten, in Convocation's halls

That here, in BURGON'S, GOULBURN's, spite,
The tide of battle should flow right,-

That e'en here, Bigotry's "hic-jacet"

Should be writ, and in large text, PLACET

That still on Earth the rising tide

Of light and knowledge, in its sway, With all the ills it sweeps aside,

Should wash some germs of good away-
That blind belief in chiefs and creeds,

And child-like faith devout, dim-eyed,
Which oft have served poor souls in needs
Where Science had been vain to guide-
Though, if on faith, not dogmas, fixed,
Sufficient simple minds to rule,-
Must take the light with darkness mixed
That serves to illumine Reason's school,-
That ill and good should thus be blent,
May cause hot spirits discontent,
But while in all around we trace it,
Rebellion 'twere to cry "NON-PLACET!"

But that this flood of love and light

Is ever rising and to rise,

That strength to bear its billows bright
Still grows in weakling human eyes-
Till souls which, bat-like, loved the dark,
Begin, at length, the light to love,
Nor longer dread the dawn to mark,
But own it, also, from above-
That e'en on Oxford's stubborn rock
No more they claim to rear a hold,
For captive Reason under lock

Of Grey Authority may sleep controlled-
That the one son of Mother Church
Who has left Oxford most i' the lurch,
Defeating Oxford's wrath, should chase it
Beaten and baffled, VALDE PLACET!

Bravery and Beauty.

THE Officers and Men who were engaged in the Looshai Expedition are, it has been announced, to receive the India Medal of 1854, with a clasp for Looshai. None but the brave deserve the fair. Clasp is equivalent to Buckle. If that clasp which those gallant fellows have especially merited could be conferred upon them, that would be something.

AN Expensive Wife makes a Pensive Husband.