“Mica, mica, parva Stella,
Miror, quænam sis tam bella!
Splendens eminus in illo
Alba velut gemma, cœlo.”

This familiar nursery rhyme has also been “revised” by a committee of eminent preceptors and scholars, with this result:

“Shine with irregular, intermitted light, sparkle at intervals, diminutive, luminous, heavenly body.
How I conjecture, with surprise, not unmixed with uncertainty, what you are,
Located, apparently, at such a remote distance from, and at a height so vastly superior to this earth, the planet we inhabit,
Similar in general appearance and refractory powers to the precious primitive octahedron crystal of pure carbon, set in the aërial region surrounding the earth.”

Dr. Lang, in his book on “Queensland,” &c., is wroth against the colonists for the system of nomenclature they have pursued, in so far as introducing such names as Deptford, Codrington, Greenwich, and so on. Conceding that there may be some confusion by the duplication in this way of names from the old country, they are surely better than the jaw-breaking native names which are strung together in the following lines:

“I like the native names, as Parramatta,
And Illawarra and Wooloomooloo,
Tongabbee, Mittagong, and Coolingatta,
Euranania, Jackwa, Bulkomatta,
Nandowra, Tumbwumba, Woogaroo;
The Wollondilly and the Wingycarribbeo,
The Warragumby, Dalby, and Bungarribbe.”

The following jeu d’esprit, in which many of the absurd and unpronounceable names of American towns and villages are happily hit off, is from the Orpheus C. Kerr (office-seeker) Papers, by R. H. Newell, a work containing many of those humorous, semi-political effusions, which were so common in the United States during the Civil War:

The American Traveller.

“To Lake Aghmoogenegamook,
All in the State of Maine,
A man from Wittequergaugaum came
One evening in the rain.
‘I am a traveller,’ said he,
‘Just started on a tour,
And go to Nomjamskillicook
To-morrow morn at four.’
He took a tavern-bed that night,
And with the morrow’s sun,
By way of Sekledobskus went,
With carpet-bag and gun.

A week passed on; and next we find
Our native tourist come
To that sequester’d village called
Genasagarnagum.
From thence he went to Absequoit,
And there—quite tired of Maine—
He sought the mountains of Vermont,
Upon a railroad train.
Dog Hollow, in the Green Mount State,
Was his first stopping-place,
And then Skunk’s Misery displayed
Its sweetness and its grace.
By easy stages then he went
To visit Devil’s Den;
And Scrabble Hollow, by the way,
Did come within his ken.
Then via Nine Holes and Goose Green,
He travelled through the State,
And to Virginia, finally,
Was guided by his fate.
Within the Old Dominion’s bounds,
He wandered up and down;
To-day at Buzzard Roost ensconced,
To-morrow at Hell Town.
At Pole Cat, too, he spent a week,
Till friends from Bull Ring came,
And made him spend the day with them
In hunting forest game.

Then, with his carpet-bag in hand,
To Dog Town next he went;
Though stopping at Free Negro Town,
Where half a day he spent.
From thence, into Negationburg
His route of travel lay,
Which having gained, he left the State
And took a southward way.
North Carolina’s friendly soil
He trod at fall of night,
And, on a bed of softest down,
He slept at Hell’s Delight.
Morn found him on the road again,
To Lousy Level bound;
At Bull’s Tail, and Lick Lizard too,
Good provender he found.
The country all about Pinch Gut
So beautiful did seem,
That the beholder thought it like
A picture in a dream.
But the plantations near Burnt Coat
Were even finer still,
And made the wond’ring tourist feel
A soft delicious thrill.
At Tear Shirt, too, the scenery
Most charming did appear,
With Snatch It in the distance far,
And Purgatory near.

But spite of all these pleasant scenes,
The tourist stoutly swore
That home is brightest after all,
And travel is a bore.
So back he went to Maine, straightway
A little wife he took;
And now is making nutmegs at
Moosehicmagunticook.”

A Rhyme for Musicians.

“Haendel, Bendel, Mendelssohn,
Brendel, Wendel, Jadasshon,
Muller, Hiller, Heller, Franz,
Blothow, Flotow, Burto, Gantz.
Meyer, Geyer, Meyerbeer,
Heyer, Weyer, Beyer, Beer,
Lichner, Lachnar, Schachner, Dietz,
Hill, Will, Bruell, Grill Drill, Reiss, Reitz.
Hansen, Jansen, Jensen, Kiehl,
Siade, Gade, Laade, Stiehl,
Naumann, Riemann, Diener, Wurst,
Niemann, Kiemann, Diener Wurst.
Kochler, Dochler, Rubenstein,
Himmel, Hummel, Rosenkyn,
Lauer, Bauer, Kleincke,
Homberg, Plomberg, Reinecke.”
—E. Lemke.