In France female enterprise knows no limit and no law. Celestine Jolivet of Belleville—who has a jolly "vay" about her—discovered a son of Mars asleep. "Not hers to reason why hers but his togs to try," so she promptly relieved the slumbering warrior of his uniform and transferred it to her own person, and—doubtless to "cover" the loan—left her own petticoats by the side of the sleeping soldier. Poor Piou-piou had a rude awakening, and was compelled to don the girl's garments, in which unwarlike garb he reached the barracks. Celestine was apprehended, and got fifteen days. Offenbach would have given her eighteen months.
GEORGIE'S AND JACKY'S HOLIDAYS.
(An Extract from the Note-book of Mr. Barlow the Younger.)
I am quite sure that, had my revered grandsire survived—as a matter of fact, he passed away some time ago, leaving a valuable connection—he would have moved with the times. In his day he certainly did his best to amuse his pupils by telling them agreeable and instructive stories, but he did not actually join in their sports. I, his descendant, pursue the even tenor of my way on a different tack. I have two lads staying with me during the vacation. Their parents are residing in the Indian portion of the British empire and the Australian colonies. They are bright, intelligent boys, full of high spirits, and yet gifted with an amount of common sense much in advance of their comparatively tender years. Georgie Barnwell is generous to a fault. He will borrow sixpence of a friend to-day, and give half of it to a beggar to-morrow. His companion, Jacky Rush, is more economical. He, too, will borrow sixpence to-day and supplement it, if possible, by a further loan on the morrow. Consequently John is richer, as a rule, than George.
"See, Sir," said Rush to me a morning or so since, "what I have got. Thanks to the kindness of some acquaintances with longer purses than my own, I have acquired a fishing-rod."
"Which I trust you will not allow him to use," put in Barnwell, impulsively. "He is considerably my junior, and I fear that, were he to fish, he might be drawn by the strength of the current into the water, and possibly be drowned. Such a calamity would be a terrible thing to his parents. What would make such a blow the more acute would be the expense of the telegram conveying the lamentable news to India. On these grounds, revered Sir, I trust you will forbid him the use of the fishing-rod."