Our leading actors and actresses of the present day will naturally strive, no less than those of the past, to do their best for the stage, and, in return, the patrons of the drama will do their best for them. But to claim for it, as its right, the social status of the recognised professions, and to be fussily indignant with society at large for refusing to acknowledge this groundless claim, is degrading to an art which should be as independent and as exalted as virtue, and content with virtue's reward.—_Fortnightly Review._ FOOTNOTES: [38] The process of obtaining an engagement is the same for a lady as a gentleman, _i.e._ a visit to an agent's office, &c., &c. Here is an advertisement which evidently offers a rare chance:— “Wanted, ladies of attractive appearance, with good singing voices. Can be received for long pantomime season. Dresses found. Salaried engagement (an exceptionable opportunity for clever amateurs desirous of adopting the profession).” GO TO THE ANT. In the market-place at Santa Fé, in Mexico, peasant women from the neighboring villages bring in for sale trayfuls of living ants, each about as big and round as a large white currant, and each entirely filled with honey or grape-sugar, much appreciated by the ingenuous Mexican youth as an excellent substitute for Everton toffee. The method of eating them would hardly command the approbation of the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals. It is simple and primitive, but decidedly not humane. Ingenuous youth holds the ant by its head and shoulders, sucks out the honey with which the back part is absurdly distended, and throws away the empty body as a thing with which it has now no further sympathy. Maturer age buys the ants by the quart, presses out the honey through a muslin strainer, and manufactures it into a very sweet intoxicating drink, something like shandygaff, as I am credibly informed by bold persons who have ventured to experiment upon it, taken internally.