cy
to those poor, hard-worked, harassed, and wearied "whips"! what a
saving there would be in club-frequenting and in cab-hire! Now would the
lounger, as he strolled along Pall-Mall, say, "No need to hurry."
"light airs of wind from the east" means a member for Galway and some
balderdash about the Greeks. "Thick weather in the Channel" implies
troubles in Ireland--nothing very new or interesting. "Dirty weather
to the east'ard" would show mischief in the Danubian provinces, and a
general sense of unquiet in the regions of the Sultan Redcliffe. These
are hints which I have not patented, and the chances are that "My Lords"
will speedily adopt them, and call them their own.

FOREIGN CLUBS.

How is it, will any one tell me, that all foreign Clubs are so ineffably
stupid? I do not suspect that we English are pre-eminent for social
gifts; and yet we are the only nation that furnishes clubable men.
Frenchmen are wittier, Germans profounder, Russians--externally at
least--more courteous and accommodating; and yet their Clubs are mere
_tripots_--gambling establishments; and, except play, no other feature
of Club-life is to be found in them.

To give a Club its peculiar "cachet"--its, so to say, trade-mark--you
require a class of men who make the Club their home, and whose interest
it is that all the internal arrangements should be as perfect, as well
ordered, and frictionless as may be. Good furniture, good servants, good
lighting, good cookery, well-adjusted temperature, and a well-chosen
cellar, are all essentials. In a word, the Club is to be the realisation
of what we all think so much of--comfort. Now, how very few foreigners
either understand or care for this! Every one who has travelled abroad
has seen the "Cercle," or "L'Union," or whatever its name be, where
men of the highest station--ministers, ambassadors, generals, and
suchlike--met to smoke and play whist, with a sanded floor, a dirty
attendance, and yet no one ever complained. They drank detestable beer,
and inhaled a pestilent atmosphere, and sat in draughts, without a
thought that there was anything to be remedied, or that human skill
could or need contrive anything better for their accommodation.

When these establishments were succeeded by the modern Club, with its
carpeted floor, silk hangings, ormolu lamps, and velvet couches, the
change was made in a pure spirit of Anglomanie; somebody had been over
to London, and come back full of the splendours