Upon re-election.

II.

III.

IV.

V.

VI.

VII.

THE NEW HOPERA OF 'ADDON 'ALL.—The title finally decided upon for the SULLIVAN-GRUNDY Opera is Haddon Hall. Lovely for 'ARRY! "'Ave you seen 'Addon 'All?" Then the 'ARRY who 'as only 'eard a portion of it, will say, "I 'addn't 'eard 'all." As a Cockney title, it's perfect. Successful or not, Author and Composer will congratulate themselves that, to deserve, if not command success, they 'ad don all they knew. If successful, they'll replace the aspirates, and it will be some time before they recover the exact date when they Had-don Hauling in the coin. Prosit!

MISCARRIAGE OF JUSTICE.—Says the Pall Mall Gazette:—"For knocking over a man selling watercress, with fatal results, a Hammersmith cabman has been committed for trial for manslaughter." If this is true, the HOME SECRETARY should immediately interpose. The action of knocking a man over is hasty, and may be indefensible. But if the Hammersmith Cabman had just grounds for belief that the man was "selling watercresses with fatal results," he should rather be commended than committed for trial.

"KEEPING-UP THE CHRISTOPHER."—(A Note from an Old Friend).—"CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS" indeed! As years ago I told Sairey Gamp about her bothering Mrs. Harris, "I don't believe there's no sich a person." That's what I says, says I, about COLUMBUS, wich ain't like any other sort of "bus" as I see before my blessed eyes every day.

Yours,
ELIZABETH PRIG.

P.S.—Mr. EDWIN JOHNSON, him as wrote to the Times last Saturday, is of my opinion. Good Old JOHNSON!

"HONORIS CAUSÂ."—To Mr. GRANVILLE MONEY, son of the Rector of Weybridge, whose gallant rescue of a lady from drowning has recently been recorded, Mr. Punch grants the style and title of "Ready MONEY."

QUESTION AND ANSWER.—"Why don't I write Plays?" Why should I?

LETTERS TO ABSTRACTIONS.

No. XV.—TO SWAGGER.

Not long ago I reminded you of CHEPSTOWE, the incomparable poet who was at one time supposed to have revolutionised the art of verse. Now he is forgotten, the rushlight which he never attempted to hide under the semblance of a bushel, has long since nickered its last, his boasts, his swelling literary port, his quarrels, his affectations—over all of them the dark waves of oblivion have passed and blotted them from the sand on which he had traced them. But in his day, as you remember, while yet he held his head high and strutted in his panoply, he was a man of no small consequence. Quite an army of satellites moved with him, and did his bidding. To one of them he would say, "Praise me this author," and straightway the fire of eulogy would begin. To another he would declare—and this was his more frequent course—"So-and-so has dared to hint a fault in one of us; he has hesitated an offensive dislike. Let him be scarified," and forthwith the painted and feathered young braves drew forth their axes and scalping-knives, and the work of slaughter went merrily forward. Youth, modesty, honest effort, genuine merit, a manifest desire to range apart from the loud storms of literary controversy, these were no protection to the selected victim. And of course the operations of the Chepstowe-ites, like the "plucking" imagined by Major Pendennis, were done in public. For they had their organ. Week by week in The Metropolitan Messenger they disburdened themselves, each one of his little load of spite and insolence and vanity, and with much loud shouting and blare of adulatory trumpets called the attention of the public to their heap of purchasable rubbish. There lived at this time a great writer, whose name and fame are still revered by all who love strong, nervous English, vivid description, and consummate literary art. He stood too high for attack. Only in one way could the herd of passionate prigs who waited on CHEPSTOWE do him an injury. They could attempt, and did, to imitate his style in their own weekly scribblings. Corruptio optimi pessima. There is no other phrase that describes so well the result of these imitative efforts. All the little tricks of the great man's humour were reproduced and defaced, the clear stream of his sentences was diverted into muddy channels, the airy creatures of his imagination were weighted with lead and made to perform hideous antics. Never had there been so riotous a jargon of distorted affectation and ponderous balderdash. Smartness—of a sort—these gentlemen, no doubt, possessed. It is easy to be accounted smart in a certain circle, if only you succeed in being insolent. Merit of this order the band could boast of plenteously.

One peculiarity, too, must be noted in The