express their opinion that it
'really seems to be clearing a little' are in more advanced stages. We
who are less afflicted shake our heads, and murmur painfully, but also
with a considerable touch of contempt, 'Poor fellows!'

The piano in the ladies' drawing-room is always going, but it excites
no soothing influence; there is an impression in the hotel that the
performers are foreigners, and should be discouraged. But there is one
instrument hanging in the hall on which everyone plays, native or
alien, and every note is discord. It is the barometer. People talk of
the delicacy of scientific instruments; if they are right, the shocks
which that barometer survives proves it to be an exception. Batter it
as we may, and do, the faithful needle, with a determination worthy of
a better cause, maintains its position at 'Much Rain.' The manager is
appealed to vehemently, coarsely; he shrugs his shoulders, protests
with humility that he cannot help the weather, or affirms it is
unprecedented--which we do not believe. Other managers--in the
Engadine, for example--the papers say, are providing excellent weather;
what does he mean by it?

At last one morning, wetter than ever, some noble spirit, the Tell of
our liberties, exclaims, 'Who would be free, himself must strike the
blow.' His actual words (if one was not writing history) are, 'Hang me
if I stand this any longer,' and they strike the keynote of everybody's
thought. He goes away by the next train, and his departure is followed
by the same effects as the tapping of a reservoir. The hotel company--I
mean the inmates; the company goes into bankruptcy--stream off at once
to their own homes. That journey through the pouring rain is the
happiest day of our wet holiday. How beautiful looms soaking, soppy,
smoky London! In that excellent town who cares for rain?

'Blow, winds, and crack your cheeks! rage! blow!
You cataracts and hurricanoes spout.'

Pooh! pooh! Call a cab--call two!

_TRAVELLING COMPANIONS._

It was held by wise men of old that adversity was the test of
friendship, but as his Excellency the Minister of the United States has
observed, _per_ Mr. Biglow, 'They did not know everything down in
Judee;' and among other subjects of which those ancient writers were
necessarily ignorant was that of Continental travel. The coming to
grief of a friend is unquestionably very inconvenient; as a millionaire
of my acquaintance observes (under the influence