[This appeal was so earnest and so urgent, that, at the risk of overburdening the volume with compositions which are not my father's, I venture to insert, whole and unabridged, the answer which Sir James Graham returned to an address, which, however publicly made, was a direct personal pleading of the strongest kind. The answer runs thus : "Sir James Graham presents his compliments to Mr. Hood, and begs to acknowledge the Magazine accompanying his letter of the 30th instant. Whitehall, 31 October, 1844."] EPIGRAM. ON HER MAJESTY'S VISIT TO THE CITY, 1844. WE'VE heard of comets, blazing things, ON THE QUEEN'S VISIT TO THE CITY. BY A TRADESMAN IN CORNHILL SURE the measure is strange SONNET TO A SONNET. Particularly commended, with the Fifth of Sir Philip Sidney's, and the pages of Froissart, to the perusal of certain Journalists across the Channel; and generally to their Young countrymen, who would do well to affect, with the beards and moustaches of the olden time, the gallant courtesy of the ancient manners. RARE Composition of a Poet-Knight, Brave, handsome, noble, affable, polite, EPIGRAM. ON A PICTURE (407) IN THE BRITISH INSTITUTION, 1843. SIR, let me just your tasteful eye enveigle 249 MRS. PECK'S PUDDING. A CHRISTMAS ROMANCE. "THE disappointment will be dreadful," said Mrs. Peck, speaking to herself, and looking from the dingy floor, up the bare wall, at the blank ceiling. "But how to get one Heaven only knows!" It was the afternoon of the 24th of December. Christmas Day was at hand, and for the first time in her existence Mrs. Peck was without a plum-pudding. For years past she had been reduced in life; but never so reduced as that! She was in despair. Not that she particularly doted on the composition; but it was a sort of superstition with her that, if she failed to taste the dish in question on that festival, she should never again enjoy luck in this world, or perhaps in the next. It was a foolish notion: but many enlightened Christians cling religiously to similar opinions; for example, as to pancakes on Shrove Tuesday, or hot cross buns on a Good Friday. So with Mrs. Peck a plum-pudding on Christmas day was an article of her faith. Yes-she must have one, though it should prove but a dumpling of larger growth. But how? Buying was out of the question she had not half a farthing in the house-a widow without a mite !-and stealing was not to be thought of-she must borrow or beg. Once arrived at this conclusion, she acted on it without delay. There were plenty of little emissaries at hand, in the shape of her own children, for the necessary errands-namely, Careful Susan, Dirty Polly, Greedy Charley, Whistling Dick, Little Jack, and Ragged Peter, so called from a fragment of linen that usually dangled behind him, like a ship's ensign from its stern. "Children!" said Mrs. Peck, "I am going to have a Christmas plum-pudding." At such an unexpected announcement, the children shouted, jumped about, and clapped their skinny hands. But their mirth was of brief duration. Second thoughts, for once none of the best, soon reminded them that the cupboard was as bare as Mother Hubbard's! while the maternal pocket was equally empty. How the thing was to happen, therefore they knew not-unless by some such fairy feat as sent black puddings tumbling down the chimney; or some such scriptural miracle as showered quails and manna in the Wilderness; or that one, which Greedy Charley remembered to have seen depicted in blue and white on a Dutch tile, of horned cattle and sheep coming down from Heaven to St. Peter, in a monster bundle. But having vainly watched the hearths, the walls, and the ceiling, for a minute or so, they gave up all such extravagant expectations. The hopes of Ragged Peter were like his nether garment, in tatters; and the dingy face of Dirty Polly looked darker than ever. There was a dead silence, at last broken by little Jack. "But mammy, you have got no plums." "And no flour," said Careful Susan. "And no suet," said Dirty Polly. "Nor no sugar," said Ragged Peter. "And no almonds and orange-peel," said Greedy Charley. "No eggs," said Careful Susan. "And never a sarcepan," said Whistling Dick. "As to almonds and orange peel," said Mrs. Peck, we must do without. Our pudding will be a very plain one. That is to say, if we get it at all, for there is not one ingre dient in the house. We must borrow and beg; so get ready, all of you, to run on my errands." "Let me go for the plums, mother," said Greedy Charley; but knowing his failing, she assigned to him to plead to Mr. Crop, the butcher, for a morsel of suet. Dirty Polly was to extract a few currents and raisins and some sugar, if she could, out of Mr. Perry, the grocer; Little Jack was to wheedle a trifle of flour from Mr. Stone, the baker; and Careful Susan was to get three eggs of Mrs. Saukins, who did mangling in her parlour and kept fowls in her cellar. Whistling Dick undertook to borrow a saucepan; and as Ragged Peter insisted also on a commission, he was sent to hunt about the streets, and pick up a little orange peelcandied, if possible. As the children had no promenade dresses to put on, they were soon ready. Susan merely reduced the angles of her bonnet front to something of a semicircle; and Dirty Polly, with a single tug, made her short scanty garment look a little more like a frock, and less like a kilt. She might, indeed have washed her face, as Ragged Peter might have tucked in some dingy linen, with personal advantage; but as they were not going to a juvenile party, they waived the ceremony. Little Jack clapped on his crownless hat; Greedy Charley took his jew's harp, the gift of a generous charityboy; Whistling Dick set up his natural pipe; and away they went, in search of a pudding by instalments. As soon as they were gone, Mrs. Peck, having made up the fire, washed her hands and arms very clean, and then seating herself at the round deal table, with her elbows on the board, and her chin between her palms, began to calculate her chances of success. The flour, provided Mr. Stone, and not his wife, was in the shop, she made sure of. The fruit was certain-the suet was very possible-the saucepan as |