"WHITTINGTON REDIVIVUS;

OR, THE BURDEN OF THE BELLS. The new Progressive Dick Whittington, would-be Lord Mayor of London, sitteth on Saturday, March 2, 1895, and meditateth on the probable meaning of the L. C. C. Election Bells:

HEAR the loud Election bells-
Noisy bells!

What a world of wonderment their clatterclash compels!

How they jangle, jangle, jangle,
On the air of coming night!
Like committee-men a-wrangle,
And my thoughts are in a tangle

Of mixed doldrums and delight.
How they chime, chime, chime!
In my head there runs a rhyme,

What a future I may gather from the voices

of the bells

The jangling and the wrangling of the
bells!

Now they sound like wedding bells,
Golden bells!

Meaning mischief in their music to the
Moderates and the swells!
Their vibrations there's a vox in
Which to me sounds like a tocsin.
From their molten golden notes,
All in tune,

What a pleasant sound there floats Like a promise of Progressive Party Votes, Blessed boon!

Oh, from Bow to Sadler's Wells,
What a gush of Unity voluminously swells.

How it swells!

How it dwells

On the Future! how it tells
Of the Progress that impels
To the swinging and the ringing
Of the bells, bells, bells.

From the Brixtons, Claphams, Southwarks,
Islingtons and Clerkenwells,

To the rhyming and the chiming of those bells!

Hear the Rate-Alarum bells

Brazen bells!

What base tarradiddles their loud turbulency

tells!

In men's startled ears in spite,

How they scream out their affright! Too much horrified to speak

They can only shriek, shriek,

Through the fog,

In a clamorous appealing to the voters to retire

That much Progressive Party, which-much like the Rates, or fire

Climbeth higher, higher, higher,
With a desperate desire,
And a bullying endeavour
Now-now to sit, or never

In the seat of Gog-Magog!

Oh, those bells, bells, bells,
What a tale their terror tells
Of despair!

What reactionary roar!
What a horror they outpour

On the bosom of the City and Mayfair.
Yet the ear it fully knows
By their twanging

And their clanging

How the voting ebbs and flows.

Yet the ear distinctly tells

In the jangling and the wrangling

How Monopoly sinks or swells

By the sinking or the swelling in the clangour

of those bells-

Beastly bells!

Their is Landlordism, Ground-rents, Dirty

Slums, and Drinking Hells

In the clamour of those horrid Moderate

compels.

So DICK WHITTINGTON-poor wight!-
Heard them ringing, with delight

At the fair prophetic promise of their tone!
For every sound that floats

May I too hope my votes

Will have grown?

And the People-ah, the People!-
Is their verdict, from each steeple,
All mine own?

Does that tolling, tolling, tolling,
Mean "Return again my DICK!"
Or do they as they 're rolling

Mean "turn out" or "cut your stick!"?
Or are we Progressives undone
Shall I be "Lord Mayor of London"?
At the Polls ?

Pussy, what is it that tolls
From each belfry, as it rolls,
Rolls?

A pæan from the bells

To the Party of the Swells?
Or a message from the bells
That Reaction howls and yells?
Does that tintinnabulation

Mean false JOE'S "Tenification"
Or our own "Unification "?
Sounds dear" Betterment" this time
In the rolling Runic rhyme
Of the bells?
Does their throbbing mean that jobbing,
And the London Landlord's robbing,
Find their finish in these bells P
That Monopoly is sobbing

Ar the re-opening of the Royal United Service Institution last week by H.R.H. the Prince of WALES, in new premises at Whitehall, a novel and ingenious electrical instrument was exhibited. By means of this addition to the list of communicators a general in the field is able not only to send an autograph letter to a colleague or subordinate at a distance, but also to convey in fac simile a drawing of his own composition. On the occasion to which reference is made, the Prince of WALES sent a message to his brother. To this despatch the Duke of CONNAUGHT was obliged to respond that he did not quite understand its full meaning. According to the reports some slight error was rectified, and then the machine worked to everyone's satisfaction. However, the fact remains that the initial attempt to convey intelligibly a message was not entirely successful. To impress upon those answerable for the perfect action of the instrument the importance of their task, we subjoin an imaginary scene of a nearly impossible situation. We will assume that a commander-in-chief is conversing with a general in the field some ten miles distant.

Commander-in-Chief (wiring). We hear here that a force of twenty-five thousand infantry are advancing by the Dover road with a view to turning your left front.

General in the Field. Kindly repeat. (Message repeated.) No, we do not want any more marmalade, as we have plenty of butter. C.-in-C. I said nothing about marmalade, I was talking of the enemy. Twenty-five thousand men are advancing on your left front. Gen. I think I now understand what you mean, but we can't get near Woolwich, because our gas has failed us. However, we will look out for the twenty-five thousand balloons you say are coming. C.-in-C. I said nothing about balloons. Infantry, I spoke of. They are approaching by the Dover Road.

Gen. Thank you for your offer, but we have plenty of hammocks. We have just seen this. Can you identify her? I forward sketch. C.-in-C. You have sent me what appears to be a drawing of either a grand pianoforte or a hippopotamus. Which is it?

Gen. It is very difficult to make out your messages. We think we understand your last. Yes, the mail to India did start without the elephants. We did not know that any had been ordered.

C.-in-C. I said nothing about elephants. What is the meaning of your drawing?

Gen. Very sorry; can't make out your message. Besides, have no more time for telegraphing. Twenty-five thousand infantry of the enemy have just been noticed on the Dover Road, threatening our left front. Why did you not tell us they were coming?

But of course, as we have already said, when the hour arrives everything will be in perfect working order. It is to be hoped that there will be a supplemen ary signal to be used in cases of extreme emergency, to decide promptly a line of action where two courses are open for adoption. It might signify "Toss up."

Nursery Rhyme for the New Woman.
(When Literary.)

I HAD a brutal husband, as is our sex's doom,
I put him in a problem-novel; then I made it boom!
I bought a little "Log-roller" who twaddled up and down,
Discovered it, and slavered it, and made it take the town.
But meaner beauties of my sex declared I wore blue hose,
And at my Gospel of Revolt cocked each a pretty nose.

"THE RIVALS" AT THE A. D. C.

ONCE again I salute you, oh actors of the Cambridge A. D. C., and congratulate you on your rendering of The Rivals-no mean task for a body of amateur actors. Specially do I note the admirably and grotesquely

of

humorous impersonation of Mrs. Malaprop by Mr. R. A. AUSTEN LEIGH. Will the elaborate Wildean paradoxes have to a future generation the freshness and the laughterProvoking qualities Mrs. Malaprop's derangements? I doubt it. At Cambridge the other day I saw a learned Doctor of Letters in convulsions over the Malapropian sallies. Will a Doctor of Letters towards the end of the next centurybe seen to smile over OSCAR's inver

sions? Mr. R. BALFOUR made an excellent Bob Acres,

broad in his characterisation, self-possessed and clear. I should have called him, however, a trifle too smart and modish in dress. Mr. GEIKIE was very effective in the rages of Sir Anthony, and Mr. WATSON played well as Jack Absolute. Admirable, too, was the Fug of Mr. TALBOT. The leading ladies were, as usual, miracles of curls and divine complexions. Yet did their voices and their hands bewray them. We were fortunately spared the gloomy maunderings of Julia and Faulkland. Hearty congratters," as they say at the sister university. A VAGRANT.