"It is stated that Mr. Swinburne's new poem was cabled to New York."
Had I wist, wailed the wire in sea's hollow,
That thousands of lines I should list,
Pumped forth by a son of Apollo,
I would not have lain here, not I,
'Twixt Briton and Yankee a tie:
No messages through me should fly,
Had I wist.
Had I wist, they would make me swallow,
Huge poems all moonshine and mist,
In addition to "speeches" all hollow;
They shouldn't have cabled a thing,
They shouldn't have used me to wing,
Leagues of rhymes that the word-spinners sing,
Had I wist.
Valuable Opinion.—We understand that the Authorities have consulted Mr. Briefless, Junior, Q.C., (Queer Counsel) on the right claimed by indifferent passers-by to stand between the police and the mob, in view of the Chief Commissioner's statement that such passers-by cause the chief difficulty in quelling disturbance; The learned Counsel has given a lucid opinion to the effect that any mere sightseer may be arrested and imprisoned, unless he or she can prove the having come to the spot for a riotous or other unlawful object.