same reply the priest would probably do in
this circumstance--How can we help it? We want a mob; if he sings, we
have it--we know his character as well as you; so only let us fill our
pockets, and then ---- I do not blame them in the least, if the popery
of their politics has palled upon the appetite; if they can work no
more miracles of reform and revolution, I do not see how they can help
calling in aid from without.

Dan, however, will not consent, like Duprez, to be damned when he is
done with; he insists on a share of the profits, and, moreover, to be
treated with some respect too. He knows he is the star of the company,
and can make his own terms; and, even now, when the house is broken
up, and the manager beggared, and the actors dismissed, like Matthews,
he can get up a representation all to himself, and make a handsome
thing of it besides.

If one could see it brought about something in the fashion of Sancho's
government of Barrataria, I should certainly like to see O'Connell on
the throne of Ireland for about twenty-four hours, and to salute King
Dan, _par la grace de diable_, king of Erin, just for the joke's sake!

A NUT FOR LEARNED SOCIETIES.

[Illustration]

We laugh at the middle ages for their trials by ordeal, their jousts,
their tournaments, their fat monasteries, and their meagre people; but
I am strongly disposed to think, that before a century pass over,
posterity will give us as broad a grin for our learned societies. Of
all the features that characterise the age, I know of none so
pre-eminently ridiculous, as nine-tenths of these associations would
prove; supported by great names, aided by large sums, with a fine
house, a library and a librarian, they do the honours of science
pretty much as the yeomen of the guard do those of a court on a levee
day, and they bear about the same relation to literature and art, that
do the excellent functionaries I have mentioned, to the proceedings
around the throne.

An old gentleman, hipped by celibacy, and too sour for society, has
contracted a habit of looking out of his window every morning, to
observe the weather: he sees a cloud very like a whale, or he fancies
that when the wind blows in a particular direction, and it happens to
rain at the same time, that the drops fall in a peculiarly slanting
manner. He notes down the facts for a month or two, and then
establishes a meteorological society, of which he is the perpetual
president, with a