But lo! the slip 'twixt cup and lip
Has made their glory dimmer;
Down, down goes the dictatorship
Of Stiggins and of Trimmer.
And threaten'd London joys to find
The Incubus o'erthrown,
The gang whose mandate 'tis to mind
All business but their own.
With "shoulders to the wheel" alway,
The grannies in a batch
Can suck such comfort as they may
From eggs they must not hatch.
A Suggestion for Improving the Stage. —M. Coquelin for having played truant—not an absolutely new part for him—from the House of Molière has been condemned by the Court of Appeal to pay five hundred francs every time he performs away from the Comédie Française. This may, or may not, be hard on M. Coquelin, an artist whose absence from the stage would be much deplored: but could not there be, in England, some Court of Public Appeal, empowered to condemn an actor or two, not artists like M. Coquelin, in similar penalties for appearing at all? Great opportunity for a new court and new procedure. Witnesses for prosecution from stalls, dress circle, gallery, pit, upper boxes. Witnesses to be heard in defence of course also; and let the best evidence win.
A Good Bank Note.—After the recent meeting of the gentlemen who manage the affairs of The Old Lady of Threadneedle Street, the Bank of England may now be considered not as a bank which may be of sand or mud, but as a rock, and as firm. The Baring Straits having been safely passed, the look-out man cries, "All's well that ends well!"
The Highly-rouged Lady's Claim To Literary Distinction.—That she is well-read.