kes liver said
something we haven't got to listen to, and then Tommy fell off the box.

"Knocked down at six pounds!" said the Headmaster, laughing; "we will
have one each." They both gave Tommy Brown three pounds and then shook
hands over the fence. Tommy says I needn't lend him my Jew's harp now.

* * * * *

FAINT PRAISE.

"The House of Commons was seen at its best to-day. The benches, it
is true, were more than all empty."--_Cork Constitution._

* * * * *

From a letter to a school-teacher:--

"I think as Eliza as the mumps. Pleas look at her throte and if she
as rub her jor well to tak away the stif feeling and oblig."

* * * * *

From War News in _The Peshawur Daily News_:--

"The 'Langford' knocked out the gunboat 'Smith' in three rounds."

How like a German gunboat (obviously "Schmidt") to disguise itself with
an English name.

* * * * *

"MISS JEFFERSON RECALLED IN BREACH SUIT."

_"Evening News" Headline._

Although the defendant in this case was a cycle-dealer, we think that
these sudden changes of costume are liable to lead to confusion and
should, therefore, be forbidden.

* * * * *

Illustration: _Officer_ (_on rounds near revolving light_). "ANYTHING
TO REPORT?"

_Sentry._ "NO, SIR; THERE'S NO MUCKLE TA RIPORRT; BUT YON FOLKS HAE BEEN
HAVIN' A HEAP O' TROUBLE WI' THEIR LIGHT: IT'S GONE OOT TWENTY TIMES IN
THE LAST OOR."

* * * * *

OUR BOOKING-OFFICE.

(_By Mr. Punch's Staff of Learned Clerks._)

STEVENSON, in one of his Fables, imagines a court presided over by the
Great White Magistrate. It was a very brief session, and the novelist
did not again use the idea. Mr. HUGH CARTON, whose name, we are informed
by the wrapper of the book, that new and most trustworthy medium of
communication between the candid publisher (unwilling that merit should
shine unobserved) and the hesitating purchaser (who needs only the truth
to send his hand to his purse) is a pseudonym covering the identity of
"one of the leading clerics of our day," has however made a whole book
of it. In _The Grand Assize_ (HEINEMANN) Mr. CARTON imagines a Day of
Judgment, on which the careers and influences of a number of social
types are weighed and punishment inflicted--for all are guilty. The
Plutocrat, t