"FAR FROM THE MADDING CROWD."
Tourist from London (to young local Minister). "How quiet and peaceful it seems here!"
Minister. "Eh, Friend, it seems peacefu'. Wha wad think we were within Seven Miles o' Peebles!"
AN ANGLO-RUSSIAN ECHO.
[At Baku, on the Caspian, a Society has been formed to abolish hand-shaking and kissing, on the ground that bacilli are propagated by such personal contact. The ladies, however, have protested against this to the Governor-General.
Daily Telegraph.
Baku is a place that is pretty well Grundyfied,
Where the good folks have all frolic and fun defied,
Where I'd be shunned, if I'd
Play at Whit-Mondayfied
Games such as "Catch-can" and Kiss-in-the-ring!
For the greybeards, it seems, of this naptha-metropolis
(Really, their reason about to o'ertopple is)
All o'er the shop'll hiss,
Hollering, "Stop! Police!
Hi, there! hand-shaking the mischief will bring!"
And kissing, they think, only leads to diphtheria—
Well, I should say, such a dread of bacteria
Quite beyond query, amounts to hysteria!
No, it won't "wash"—they don't either, I fear!