"Tell me, Knife-Grinder, what _your_ little game is.
Do you mean playing straight with me and others?
Or would you jocky Erin like a confounded
Saxon attorney?

"Give us a glimpse of that same Memorandum!
Pledge yourself clear to what needs no explaining!
Prove that your plan is not quite a sham, sly-whittled
Down into nullity!

"Ere I depart (if go I must, TIM HEALY)
Give me a pledge that I'm not sold for nothing.
Tell us in plain round words, without evasion, the
_True_ Hawarden story."

_Knife-Grinder_.

"Story! God bless yer! I have none to tell, Sir!
_Never_ tell stories, I; 'tis my sole business
This Wheel to turn with treadle and cry, 'Knives and
Scissors to grind O!'

"Constabulary? Question of Land Purchase?
Number of Irish Members due in justice?
Never said aught about 'em; don't intend to--
Not for the present.

"I shall be glad to do what honour urgeth;
Grind on alone, if you will give me _carte-blanche_,
Make room for JUSTIN, and forbear to meddle
With politics, Sir!"

_Friend of Ireland_.

"_I_ give thee _carte-blanche?_ I will see thee blowed first--
Fraud! whom no frank appeal can move to frankness--
Sophist, evasive, garrulous, word-web-spinning
Subtle Old Spider!!!"

[_Kicks the Knife-Grinder, overturns his Wheel, and exit in a fury of
patriotic enthusiasm and forcible language._

* * * * *

CAPITAL AND LABOUR FORECAST;

_OR, SIX OF ONE AND HALF-A-DOZEN OF THE OTHER._

Though in some quarters a better feeling was reported to have
prevailed, still, according to latest accounts, the outlook can
scarcely be regarded as satisfactory. A meeting of the Amalgamated
Engineering Tram-Drivers' Mutual Stand-Shoulder-to-Shoulder
Strangulation Society was held on Glasgow Green yesterday afternoon,
at which, amid a good deal of boisterous interruption, several
delegates addressed the assembled audience and recounted their recent
experiences up to date. There were still 1700 of the Company's old
hands out of work, and though, thanks to the profound enthusiasm,
"their just cause" had excited amidst the Trade Societies in the
South, by which, owing to subscriptions from no less important
bodies than the Bootmakers' Benevolent Grandmothers' Association, and
Superannuated Undertakers' Orphan Society, they had been able to stay
out and defy th