MANY LICENSES AND ONLY ONE FISH SAUCE.
The London County Council sits upon the site of one of London's oldest casino-gardens ("Spring Gardens"), and no one can therefore wonder that it sits upon music-halls. It did not open its proceedings on October 25 with the Chant du Départ, which was disappointing. Having gone wrong on water, was it not only natural that it should go wrong on gin, and in one great case give a verdict in favour of hole-and-corner drinking? It invented a new dance called the "Skate Dance." This is something in these days of choregraphic enterprise. It should not, however, have fettered its invention with a license. If skating is "dancing on skates," what is not dancing? Is "dancing attendance" illegal without a license? Is the "poetry of motion" illegal without a license, and which is the most illegal?—the poetry or the motion? Does the "music of the spheres" require a license? Is the ploughboy, "whistling as he goes for want of thought," infringing any Act of Parliament? If I copied an old poet, and asked a young lady to "drink to me only with her eyes," could she do so in an auditorium without the permission of the L. C. C. and the Brewster Magistrates?
A Bewildered One.
Ballymacarrett—et præterea nihil.—The "Natives of Ulster" resident in Glasgow came out of their shells for their annual reunion in the Waterloo Hall of that city, and were presided over upon the occasion by Mr. Wolff, M.P. The member for East Belfast was eloquent upon various subjects, but attained the highest pinnacle of the rhetorical art when he spoke of the district with which he is connected and which "bears the beautiful name of Ballymacarrett." This poetically called spot appears to be the veritable Elysium of Erin, "where"—according to the enthusiastic orator—"people live happily. A place which would arouse the envy of most towns even in Scotland!" Evidently an Utopia wherein gaols and lunatic asylums are conspicuously absent; for who could commit a crime or go "balmy on the crumpet" in Ballymacarrett! Hark to the bard of the locality:—
Great Edinbro's nothing, and nothing is Perth,
And naught are the cities most vaunted on earth:
But give me my home, be it only a garret,
'Mid the blessèd surroundings of Ballymacarrett!