THINGS TO BE BORNE IN MIND IN SEPTEMBER.
If anyone sends you a brace of partridges, do not eat them yourself, but tie one of your own cards to them, write on the back of it, "shot this morning," and send them where you think the attention will pay best. In that way you are much more certain to make a hit than if you foolishly attempted to shoot them yourself.
If you are a member of parliament, get a "pair," that you may be off to your manor, this being now the custom. If you like stag-hunting, you had better stay on a railway committee.
If you meet a friend, complain of being dull and the emptiness of London: this looks as if your acquaintances were in the habit of going out of town; the fact being, that no one you know leaves London from one year's end to the other except your tailor.
If you are a barrister, you are expected to be on circuit at this time; but as this is expensive when you have no brief, put a placard on your outer door, "On the Northern Circuit," and live in a single room at Manor Cottage, Kennington, or a similar locality.
SCORPIO—The Slanderer—"I could a tale unfold."
THE ZODIAC—OCTOBER.
SCORPIO—THE SLANDERER.
Well, I really can't see how a laugh can be got
Out of slander, and scorpions, and lies, and what not;
If out of such subjects grow matter of mirth,
'Tis for gentry in black who live lower than earth.
And I know for my own part I've reason to grieve
That young women anonymous letters believe;
What a Scorpion was he who wrote my Mary Anne
That I was a very "irregular man!"
Oh! cruel George Cruikshank, how could you invent
Such a horrible picture with comic intent?
I hope that if ever you've your Mary Anne,
You'll be called, as I was, an "irregular man."
THINGS TO BE BORNE IN MIND IN
OCTOBER.
That if you are a sober man, according to the old song, you may now prepare to "fall as the leaves do," and die this month.
If the settling for the Leger has prevented you from settling your day-book, and you wish to commit suicide without the discredit of felo-de-se, get invited to a battue. Place yourself about the centre of the wood, and you will be tolerably certain to be hit by something or somebody.
That theatres are said to open this month; but as nobody is ever known to go to them, the only proof of this is the fact that they are found open at a later time of the year.
The clubs become empty about this time, therefore it is a good opportunity of asking any friend of uncouth or disreputable appearance to dine with you, as he will only afford amusement to the servants instead of the members, which is not likely to be so painful to your feelings.
Freshmen go up to the Universities, and may be expected to come down upon their governors with heavy bills. Medical students walk the Hospitals, and run into debt.
