"Certainly. Oblige them!" added Mr. Punch, taking a banjo from one of the crowd and placing it in Father TIME's hands. "Give them a stanza of the Ballad of Truth."
He turned his ring, and his aged companion struck up the following ditty:—
"Know ye the land where dwells only mock-turtle,
Where wine that should gladden but makes you fell queer.
Where bayonets bend, where guns burst and hurtle
Their breech in the face of their friends at the rear,
Where lamps labelled 'safety' with just terrors fill you,
Where water supplied you for milk is no theft,
Where pills that should cure, if persisted in, kill you
And the 'Hair Resurrector' takes all you've got left!