Like the treble X ale of Taylor and Hanbury!” “Here, good Christians, are five Reasons why you _shouldn't_ go to a fair, published by the London Lachrymose Society for the suppression of fun.” “And here, good Christians, are five-and-fifty why you _should!_ published by my Lord Chancellor Cocke Lorel, President of the High Court of Mummery, and Conscience-keeper to his merry Majesty of Queerumania, for the promotion of jollity.” One of the better order of mendicants, on whose smooth, pale brow, hung the blossoms of the grave, arrested our attention with the following madrigal which pleased us, inasmuch as it seemed to smack of the olden time. “I love but only one And thou art only she That loves but only one-- Let me that only be! Requite me with the like, And say thou unto me Thou lov'st but only one, And I am only he!” “Cold comfort this, broiling and frying under a burning hot sun!” soliloquized a blind ballad-singer. And, having two strings to his bow, and one to his fiddle, he put a favourite old tune to the rack, and enforced us to own the soft impeachment of THE BALLAD SINGER'S APOLOGY FOR GREENWICH FAIR. Up hill and down hill,'tis always the same; Mankind ever grumbling, and fortune to blame! To fortune,'tis uphill, ambition and strife; And fortune obtain'd--then the downhill of life! We toil up the hill till we reach to the top; But are not permitted one moment to stop! O how much more quick we descend than we climb! There's no locking fast the swift wheels of Old Time. Gay Greenwich! thy happy young holiday train Here roll down the hill, and then mount it again. The ups and downs life has bring sorrow and care; But frolic and mirth attend those at the fair. My Lord May'r of London, of high city lineage, His show makes us glad with, and why shouldn't Greenwich? His gingerbread coach a crack figure it cuts! And why shouldn't we crack our gingerbread nuts? Of fashion and fame, ye grandiloquent powers, Pray take your full swing--only let us take ours! If you have grown graver and wiser, messieurs, The grinning be ours, and the gravity yours! To keep one bright spark of good humour alive, Old holiday pastimes and sports we revive. Be merry, my masters, for now is your time-- Come, who'll buy my ballads? they're reason and rhyme.” Peckham and Blackheath fairs were celebrated places of resort in former times, and had their modicum of strange monsters. “Geo. I. R.