envy? Why, certainly. And the Gillivan-Sulbert Savoyards could, if they liked, tell Judge Lawrance that "thirty-nine pounds per diem" is not an over-estimate of the share apportioned to each of the three leading scions of the House of the Savoy, composer, librettist, and manager, during the run of one of their real successes, such, for example, as was The Mikado. 'Tis a pity Composer Solomon did not call Composer Sullivan to testify to what might be the pecuniary value of a successful composition. We wish the deserving Taylor better luck with the next suit he takes in hand.

OUR BOOKING-OFFICE.

Good supply of all sorts of game at Christmas, and especially from the preserves of Messrs. De la Rue. Try "Animal Snap" and see how you like it. Thanks to Dean and Son—i.e., Senior Dean and Junior Dean—for their Golden Hours, The Prize, Peeps into Paradise, and The Venetian Blind Moveable Picture Book, the last being the best of all. And Dean's Cracker Toy-books will certainly go off well. As we Sweep through the Deep. "Quite the light publishers for tales of the sea are 'Nelson and Sons,'" quoth the Baron, "and no doubt they hope that every man will do his duty at Christmas time and go in for Nelsonian boys and girls books." "As we Sweep" is by that true Horse Marine (if there is anything in a name), yclept Dr. Gordon Stables, R.N.

The Baroness recommends The Rosebud Annual. A lovely posy of pictures and tales to be found on the shelf of James Clarke & Co., Publishers, and, the Baroness supposes, Nursery Gardeners. "Natural this," quoth a Baronite, "here is a Miss Parson's Adventures told by a Clark Russell!" If you want it send to Chapman and Hall. And all the Baronites say many thanks to Macmillan & Co. for a delightful new edition of Miss Mary Mitford Russell's Our Village.

Our compliments to Mrs. Lovett Cameron on A Tragic Blunder. A blow given by mistake to the wrong person nearly ruins the entire happiness of several people, but it all comes right at the end of two vols. from Mrs. Cameron's pen. It is a nice light entertainment with which to while away an hour or two.

"I like Richard Escott," says the Baron, laying down the Macmillanitish one-volume novel of that name written by E. H. Cooper. "It is an interesting story, and might be the first of a series similar to the Rougon Macquart family, as, when this tale finishes, there are sufficient Escotts alive to carry on the story of their family through many generations, only, unfortunately, the date of this story cannot be taken further back than, say, about ten years ago, if that. To give the family breathing-time, we should require some stories about the Escotts under Queen Anne and the Georges, and then we could return to the fortunes of the sons and daughters the Richard Escott.

"With fear and trembling, yet with a sensation of enjoying some secret wicked pleasure," quoth the Baron, confidentially, "I retired with Mr. Ashby Sterry's Naughty Girl into my sanctum, which, as its name implies, is just the very place to which I ought to retire with a young lady bearing such a character." A Naughty Girl is published in the "Modern Library Series" brought out by Messrs. Bliss, Sands, and Foster; and how happy would Sands be—run out, of course—and where would Foster be unless foster'd by the other two—without Bliss, who makes quite a little 'eaven below of this Publishing Firm. Blissful must have been Mr. Ashby Sterry's state when he wrote so excellent a Dickensian description, as he has done in the earlier part of this book, of Boxing Night at Drury Lane, and when he gave a finishing touch to this story in showing how Beryl and Jack were brought together in spite of a temporary misunderstanding and estrangement. "Bravo Pantalaureate of many a frilling poem! A Happy Christmas to you and your readers!" quoth the warm-hearted and appreciative

Baron de Book-Worms.

An "Up to Date" Young Man.

"'TWAS IN TRAFALGAR"'S THEATRE.

As in the case of the old farcical play The Three Hunchbacks, on which an opéra bouffe was founded, and of all plays ancient and modern depending for their success on the exact physical resemblance existing between three distinct persons, directly the audience has grasped the fact, they enter heartily into the humour of the complications. Now, in Tom, Dick and Harry, the audience, having once mastered and allowed the given thesis, viz., that Mr. Charles Hawtrey, Mr. Ernest Percy, and Mr. Arthur Playfair are so exactly alike that even their own wives and sweethearts are unable to distinguish one Antipholus from another Antipholus, and both or either from a third Antipholus, then the fun of the confusion gains upon them, and Mrs. R. Pacheco's three-act farce at the Trafalgar Square Theatre gives the spectators fits, which assume the proportion of convulsions of laughter absolutely dangerous to the safety of various individuals. For this deponent can testify to the effect of the fun of the farce on a small boy in a box, who literally jumped with joy—quite a little Jack-in-the-Box—and in his excitement would have precipitated himself into the stalls, but for the united energies of the family party, which retained him amongst them by sheer force. He had been less wildly enthusiastic about Pickwick, owing, perhaps, to the restraining appearance of Tommy Bardell, whose presence on the stage the Boy in the Box might, perhaps, have been inclined to view with disfavour, though giving a rapturous welcome to Miss Jessie Bond's charming impersonation of Mrs. Bardell, to Mr. Little's life-like Pickwick, and to Mr. Charles Hawtrey's sentimental but sulky Baker. However he made up for any show of envy towards Tommy by cordially applauding Mr. Edward Solomon's catching melodies, which are not less humourously than skilfully orchestrated; and his (I am still speaking of the Boy in the Box) genuine applause throughout the evening quite led that of the house, and was a real treat to witness, culminating as it did in a volcanic eruption of irrepressible joy at the conclusion of the second act of Tom, Dick and Harry. Miss Vane Featherston, the Misses Esmond and Williams, the ever-clever Miss Sophie Larkin, in a difficult part, Mr. W. F.