_Hired Waiter_ (_handing the liqueurs_). "_Please_, sir, _don't_ make me laugh--I shall spill 'em all!"] * * * * * [Illustration: OVERHEARD AT A CITY RESTAURANT "I said Welsh _radish_, not _horse rabbit_!"] * * * * * [Illustration: IRRESISTIBLE _Our Robert_ (_on duty in the provinces, offering dish to neglected spinster_). "Little duck!" [_In such a tone of voice, that, at the risk of the sage and----she accepts!_] * * * * * [Illustration: _Host._ "I say, my boy, shall we join ladies in drawing-room?" _Guest._ "I sh'inksho." _Host._ "Can you say, 'The scenery's truly rural 'bout here?'" _Guest._ "Sc-scenery tooralooral." _Host._ "All right, come along!"] * * * * * [Illustration: HE KNEW THE CUISINE.--_Hungry Diner_ (_scanning the menu_). "Look here, waiter, I'm starving. I think I'll have a little of everything!" _Waiter._ "Yessir. (_Bawls off._) 'Ash one!"] * * * * * [Illustration: SONGS AND THEIR SINGERS] * * * * * [Illustration: SONGS AND THEIR SINGERS] * * * * * [Illustration: SONGS AND THEIR SINGERS] * * * * * [Illustration: SONGS AND THEIR SINGERS] * * * * * [Illustration: SONGS AND THEIR SINGERS] * * * * * [Illustration: SONGS AND THEIR SINGERS] * * * * * [Illustration: SONGS AND THEIR SINGERS] * * * * * AFTER-DINNER SPEECHES "When the wine is in, the wit is out;" Only to dolts the adage reaches. No wise man could for a moment doubt The value of after-dinner speeches. _Punch_ can remember the time when Peel, Whose wisdom still the country teaches, After steak and port, his nine o'clock meal, Made the best of after-dinner speeches. When the Ministers come to the Mansion House, (The King of London their presence beseeches,) No guest who has any touch of _nous_ Will be weary of after-dinner speeches. When the Royal Academy blooms in May, With its pretty girls and their cheeks like peaches Who won't, on the opening Saturday, Listen to after-dinner speeches? When there's ought that's generous to be done, A greeting to pay that no soul impeaches, A dinner's the best thing under the sun, And its gold coin the after-dinner speeches. And as to the House, which often suffers From talk that to dreariest platitude reaches, It does not often allow its duffers To make long after-dinner speeches. * * * * * [Illustration: SCENE--CHOP-HOUSE _Enter Street Boy, and, with suppressed ecstasy._ "Oh, please, there's your cat and kittens having such a game with the things in the winder!"] * * * * *