ne he emptied the jugs and the water-can,
and then descended to his own flat, fiendishly triumphant, as he
thought of the havoc he must have made in GIDLING's fire-place.

But when he got to his own flat, he found that he had emptied all that
water down his own chimney.

After that he gave up his revenges, together with his affections and
his apartments. But GIDLING tells the story with considerable unction;
the facts of it were partly derived from BUDWELL's servant and partly
from Miss VANE--with whom GIDLING is beginning to be on more than
friendly terms.

* * * * *

INTERNATIONAL NURSERY-TALE CONGRESS.

The Chair was taken by Mr. JOHN HORNER, P.R.I.N.T.C., lineal
descendant of the celebrated "Jack" of that ilk.

[Illustration]

The President said he had no desire to waste the meeting's valuable
time. He would at once address himself (and the company present) to
the myth, if myth it could be called, which had immortalised his own
name. Need he say he alluded to the legend of "Little Jack Horner"?
(_Cheers._) Some commentators are of opinion that "HORNER." was a
typographical error for "HOMER." But the prefix; and the epithet
combined to militate against this ingenious and plausible, but
specious, theory. "HOMER" was not in any sense "Little," nor was his
Pagan name "JACK." Again, "Corner," in the second line, could not
in any language have ever rhymed with "HOMER." He knew that "Cromer"
furnished them with a rhyme for "HOMER;" but if this were accepted,
what became of the ancient Greek, of the Syriac, of the Phoenician,
of the Nimrodic legends, nay, of the very _Iliad_ itself, if "HOMER"
were a native of "Cromer"? (_Loud and prolonged cheers._) No!
"Jack Horner," or, as it was originally written, "Jakorna," was
of Scandinavian origin, and it was, in all probability, a mythmic
rhyth--No, beg pardon, he should say a rhythmic myth (_Cheers_)
sung by a wandering Sam Oar Troupe on their visiting Egypt and the
Provinces before the time of the Celtic-Phoenician O'SIRIS, or at
least before the reign of RAMESES THE FIRST, ancestor of the great
Scotch RAMSEY family--(_Cheers_)--at one of the social entertainments
given on a non-hunting day by that eminent sportsman NIMROD. Then
came the question of where was "the corner" in which Jakorna secluded
himself? Of course, Christmas, as differentiating this pie from all
others, was a modern substitution. The original word was probably
"Kosmik."