TO M. L. L.--M. L. L., you have chosen your own lot: may it be a happy one! and if it be so I would not have you think of the desolate heart you leave behind; but oh! my child, if sorrow should ever overtake you, if you should find, when too late, that you have been leaning on a broken reed; then, my Maria, come back to her whose heart has ever cherished you; she will always be ready to receive you. Maybe M. L. L. has proved herself devoid of gratitude, and left a kind home to follow the fortunes of some adventurer. But the good heart of the advertiser does not turn sour, nor does she give vent to repining; and so even in advertisements do we see the finest as well as the worst sides of human nature. In the same paper that contained the address just given we stumbled across one of the most laconic notices ever seen. It says-- IF H. R. will Return, I will forgive him. E. R. This is evidently from a relenting parent, whose sternness has been subdued by the continued absence of his prodigal. Most likely the latter returned, and went away again as soon as “the guv’nor” showed signs of resuming sway. And so on through one of those wretched dramas with which all people must be acquainted, in which the principal characters are a broken-hearted mother, a worn-out and prematurely old father, and an utterly demoralised, drunken, and perhaps dishonest son, who is most likely a brutal husband as well. Of quite another kind is this, which is also from the _Times_:-- TO EQUATOR.--Fortuna audaces juvat. Vincit omnia veritas.--E. W. As we have before remarked, the newspapers of to-day give us no such specimens of secret and mysterious advertising as those we have unearthed, although the opportunities are far more numerous than--and we presume the occasions quite as frequent as--they were twenty years ago, for every daily paper, and a good many of the weeklies, now keep special columns for the display of private announcements. Quite unique, however, in its way is one which appeared in _Lloyd’s_ half-a-dozen years ago. It says that =HARRIET AND HARRY COMPTON= ARE well.--124, Stamford-street, Lambeth. The ignorance may be crass, but we are bound to confess that even now we are not aware of the claims upon publicity of Mr and Mrs Compton. The information is given in style worthy of a royal bulletin, and doubtless it much interested all whom it may have concerned. A very faint attempt at cryptography is made in an advertisement which appeared comparatively recently in one of the penny papers, the writer of which must have had great faith in the dulness of the British public if he thought that backward writing would not be at once detected. This is it:-- LUCKY 6d. and 4d.!!--Came back by train a few minutes after meeting you that forenoon, the only real reason for my coming. Always the same feeling for you as expressed. Od etirw ecno ot pihs ot yas uoy evah nees siht. Quite efas Rolias. Will sometimes advertise.