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e, England, Lord ROBERT MONTAGU, M.P., was lately burned in effigy by some intelligent boors, because he had joined the Roman Catholic faith. That tells badly for the burners, who should not have cared an _f i g_ about the matter. * * * * * "Walker." MCETTRICK, the pedestrian, was arrested at Boston, a few days since, for giving an exhibition without a license. He gave bail. Probably _leg_-bail. * * * * * On the Bench When is a judge like the structures that are to support the Brooklyn Suspension-Bridge? When he's called a _caisson._ * * * * * AN OFFICER WHO MUST ALWAYS BE OUT OF GUN-SHOT RANGE. General FARRE. * * * * * THE PLAYS AND SHOWS. By this time everybody has seen _Rip Van Winkle,_ and everybody has expressed the same unbounded admiration of Mr. JEFFERSON'S matchless genius. But the world never has been, and doubtless never will be, without the pestiferous presence of Reformers, Men of Progress, Earnest Men, who insist upon improving everything after their own fashion, and who are unhappy because they did not have the opportunity of making the solar year consist of an even number of days, and because they were not present at the building of the Ark, in order to urge upon NOAH the propriety of attaching a screw propeller to that primitive Great Eastern. These horribly energetic nuisances never find anything that precisely suits them, and are always insisting that everything stands in need of the improvements which they gratuitously suggest. Latterly they have ventured to attack _Rip Van Winkle,_--not the actor, but the play,--and to insist that the closing scene should be so modified as to make the play a temperance lecture of the most unmistakable character. If you recollect--as of course you do--the last scene in that exquisite drama, you can still hear "RIP'S" tremulous voice as he says, "I will take my pipe and my glass, and will tell my strange story to all my friends. And I will drink _your_ good health, and your family's, and may you live long and prosper." And now come the Progressive Nuisances, and ask Mr. JEFFERSON to change this ending so that it will read as follows:-- GRETCHEN.--"Here is your glass, RIP." RIP.--"But I swore off." GRETCHEN.--"Bless you, my husband. Promise me never more to touch the intoxicating beer-mug." RIP.--"I promise
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