HOUSE OF LORDS CHARWOMAN. "WELL! THEM ROGEBERRIES, AND 'ERBERT GLADSTINGS, AND HASKWIDGES, AND THE REST ON 'EM MAY TORK-AND THEY MAY TORK-BUT THEY H'AINT TURNED HUS OUT YET!!" A PIER OF THE EMPIRE. (By a Commoner of the Nation.) 66 GOSSIP WITHOUT WORDS. ["AUTOLYCUS," in the Pall Mall Gazette of October 11, inveighs against the necessity of conversation between friends :-"If I find a girl nice to look at, and she has taken great pains to make herself nice to look at, why cannot we pass the evening, I looking at her, and she being looked at? But no, we must talk."] UNDOUBTEDLY, if conversation were abolished, "short stories" in the future would be still further abbreviated. Here is a beautiful specimen of blank-or Anthony Hope-less-dialogue: THE NELLY NOVELETTES. "!" exclaimed Miss NELLY EATON, suddenly, with her quivering nostril. "?" I asked with my right eyebrow, rousing myself from a fit of abstraction. She pointed at a young man who had just strolled past our seats in the Row without noticing her. He was dressed in the height of fashion, and was accompanied by a lady in very smart attire. 44 ." explained NELLY, with her mouth tightly shut. I looked at her, and gathered by a swift process of intuition that she had made that boy, and taught him to drink and smokeof course, in moderation; had got his hair cut, and had rescued him from an adven- "Taught him to smoke." turess. From her he had learnt not to go to Monday Pops, nor to carry things about in brown paper-in fact, he owed everything to her And now! Hotel Metropole], and, after some further dances, the curtain falls." Nothing can be prettier, and more truly moral, than On Brighton Pier. I can conscientiously recommend it to every member of the L. C. C.; some will smile at the eccentric dance of Major As licensing day was approaching, I thought it my duty to visit the Spooner (Mr. WILL BISHOP); others will grin at the more boisterous Empire Theatre of Varieties in Leicester Square, so that if needs be I humour of Christopher Dollar (Mr. JOHN RIDLEY); and all must could appear as a witness either for the prosecution or the defence. weep at the depressed velvet coat of Don Diego (Mr. GEORGE I am happy to say that my expedition has put me in a position to join ASHTON), the husband of Senora Dolares, in search of a (comparathe garrison. From first to last-from item No. 1 to item No. 10-tively) long-lost daughter. Judging from the reception the ballet the entertainments at the Empire are excellent. And in this received the other evening, I fancy that On Brighton Pier will general praise I am able to include "Living remain on London boards for any length of time. Pictures," which are all that even an archbishop could wish that they should be. But the chief attraction of the evening is a new ballet divertissement in one tableau, called On Brighton Pier, which has evidently been put up to teach the members of the L. C. C. how much better things are done in the Sussex watering place than in the great metropolis. According to "the Argument," when the scene opens, people are promenading in the sun, and some gentlemen bribe the bath chairmen to give up their places in the evening so that they may flirt with the girls accompanying the invalids." But possibly as an afterthought this was thought a little too strong for the Censor of Spring Gardens. I found the gentlemen" (most of them in high white hats), and then I discovered the bath chairmen, but there was nothing to lead me to believe that the connecting links between the two were bribery and corruption. In addition to this plat à la Don Giovanni there were an entrée in the shape of a gathering of schoolboys and schoolgirls, a soufflé in some military plus naval drill, and a pièce de résistance in a change of scene from the deck of the Pier to the depths of the sea beneath it. And here let me say that I use résistance in a purely culinary sense, as nothing could have worked more smoothly than the transformation. Madame KATTI LANNER, by whom the ballet has been invented, is a past mistress in the art of concocting terpsichorean trifles, and never admits any difficulty in combining the poetry of fancy with the actuality of fact. In her latest production she finds that after a while a change of scene is necessary. The public, after admiring the refreshment stalls and the distant view of the Grand Hotel, want something more. Certainly, why not? The daughter of an American millionaire, who has met a rather effeminate gentleman for the first time, overcome by the heat, falls asleep. Then, to quote from "the Argument," in her dream she sees sirens and sea-nymphs, led by the Queen Coralie (Signorina BICE PORRO), unsuccessfully attempt to lure away her lover, but-awaking from her sleep-the vision disappears, and she finds him at her feet. All this was very pretty, and the scruples of the L. C. C. were considered by the lack of success of Queen Coralie to shake the swain's fidelity to his betrothed. Although evidently interested in the dances of the sirens and sea- [Here I am sorry to say that our dialogue becomes somewhat ellipnymphs-in spite of their treating him with little or no attention-hetical, owing to the difficulty of finding enough unappropriated was ultra discreet in making the acquaintance of her submarine printers' symbols to represent our different shades of silence. Howmajesty. When the Queen stood on one toe he merely accepted her ever, with luck, I may be able to scrape together a few more, and invitation to hold her hand, and thus enable her to revolve on the come to some sort of conclusion.] tip of her right toe-but went no further. And really and truly, as Let me see where were we? Oh, on the subject of the a gentleman, it was impossible for him to do less. At any rate his boy and his companion, who, it seems, were engaged. conduct was so unexceptional in Grace Dollar's dream, that his ""resumed NELLY, in a look which spoke three volumes. I fiancée, who, according to "the Argument," had had a slight divined at once that she had thrown him over, that there had been quarrel with him," immediately sought reconciliation. Besides the an awful scene, and his mother had written a horrid letter, that he submarine interlude, On Brighton Pier has a serious underplot. had come back and abjectly apologised, that he said she had destroyed Senora Dolares (Signorina CAVALLAZZI), who has been searching all his faith in women (the usual thing), that he over the world for her daughter, who had been stolen from her ten went on sending letters for a whole year: in years ago, is personally conducted to the pleasant promenade off the fact, that it made her quite uncomfortable. beach. Husband and wife seemingly spend Really, NELLY can give points to LORD the entire day on the Pier. They are here BURLEIGH's nod! in the morning, in the sunshine, and here when the variegated lamps are lighted at night. The Senora is pleased at nothing. She regards the vagaries of a negro comedian with indifference, and does not even smile at the gambols of a clown dog. Suddenly a girl called Dora appears. And now once more to quote the Argument. Dora plays upon her mandoline some melody the Senora Dolares recognises. She quickly asks the girl where she first heard it; and Dora says that a lady used to sing it to her in her early days, and that the same lady gave her a cross, which she produces. The Senora, by means of the cross, recognises in Dora her long-lost child. Amid "I can conscientiously recommend it." 66 66 "S" I visibly commented, not knowing for the moment how else to express myself. In fact I was getting just a trifle out of my depth. However, I gazed again at her. Yes, she had deeply eloquent blue eyes, fringed with dark eyelashes, that voiced forth every emotion! Stay, I am afraid that in my admiration my speechless remarks had wandered from the topic of our mute discussion. "+" interjected her pitying but impatient glance, telling me that my devotion was useless. 64 I looked very miserable. It is generally understood that I am the most miserable of men since Miss EATON's engagement to an American millionaire. 66 "P" inquired my right eye, meaning, had she not been in love with him a little bit ? Miss NELLY prodded the path with her parasol. "" I asked again, referring to a different person, and, I am afraid, squinting. Miss NELLY looked for the fraction of an instant in my direction. 66 "I repeated. Miss NELLY looked straight in front of her. There was her fiancé, the American millionaire! 66 -!" That is, I smilingly withdrew. SATISFACTORY REPORTS AS TO THE AMEER.-It was not an illness, great excitement she leads her tenderly away [in the direction of the it was A mere indisposition." 66 THE ANNUAL FOOTBALL MATCH BETWEEN THE OLD RED SANDSTONE ROVERS AND THE PLIOCENE WANDERERS WAS IMMENSELY AND DESERVEDLY POPULAR!! "HYMEN HYMENÆE!" propos of a Public Favourite). Mr. Punch wishes health and happiness to the bride of Sir WILLIAM GREGORY, known to us all, during a long and honourable theatrical career in the very first line of Dramatic Art, as Mrs. STIRLING the incomparable, always of sterling worth in any piece wherein she took a part. She was always at her best. Latterly she has been chiefly associated with the Nurse in Romeo and Juliet, and no better representative of the character could ever have been seen on any stage. Her recent marriage has in it somewhat of a Shaksperian association, for were not the Nurse and Gregory both together in the same establishment, yclept the noble House of Capulet? And what more natural that these two should come together, and "the Nurse to Juliet" should become the "wife to Gregory"? 66 STOPPING" THE WAY IN THE COLONIES.- Where British Colonists are first in the field, be the field where it may, it is unwise to allow any non-Britishers to get as far as a semi-colony, but at once they should be made to come to a full-stop. As it is, Great Britain looks on in a state of com(m)a, only to wake up with a note of exclamation, but not of admiration, when it is too late to put a note of interrogation. With a manly breadth of soul, With a virile power of "hit," Sturdy patriot, and yet As we turn each well-thumbed leaf; Years your spirit could not tame, In your songs all strength and ease, And of such were you not one? Makes a boy of a grey bard, VENETIAN FLOWER SELLERS YOUNG, dark-eyed beauties, graceful, gay, So I expected you to be, Adorning in a charming way This silent City of the Sea. But you are very far from that; You're forty-sometimes more-and fat. Oh, girls of Venice! WOODS, R.A., "CITY IMPROVEMENTS. The City isn't likely to lose any chance of a dig at the L. C. C. Last week, at a meeting of City Commissioners of Sewers at Guildhall, Alderman GREEN,-not so verdant by any means as the name would seem to imply,protested against the great delay on the part of the L. C. C. in regard to the improvements in Upper Thames Street. So the London County Council is sitting considering "dum defluit ANNUS"-representing the "amnis ari" and while Upper Thames Street is, pace the ever Green Alderman, in a state of stagnation as far as "improvements are concerned. A DROUTH-AND-MOUTHDISEASE.-A curious disease, originating, it is said, in the East, has lately baffled medical men. It is called "beriberi." Introduce another "e" into the first and third syllable, and the name might serve for that thirsty kind of feverish state with which no Anti-closingof-the-public-at-any-timeSociety is able to cope. "PREMATUER?" -Per the Leadenhall Press, Mr. TUEK is bringing out a real old Horn-book, that is, a facsimile of the ancient Hornbook. For years have we longed to see the genuine article. It will be in Hornamental cover, of course. Suc cès au livre de la corne!" Idealising, I should say A thing that painters often do; And do your best to drive me mad. My caffe nero on the square, Oh go away! I hate the sight Of flowers since that afternoon When first we met. I think of flight, SUGGESTED MOTTO FOR THE AERATED BREAD COMPANY. "His sleep Was aëry light, from pure digestion bred." Paradise Lost, B. V., line 4. |