What is it gives the price of stocks, Of Poyais Loans, and patent locks, And wine at the West India Docks? The Paper. What tells you too who kill’d or hurt is, When turtles fresh arriv’d, whose skirt is Much relish’d by Sir William Curtis? The Paper. What speaks of thieves and purses taken, And murders done, and maids forsaken, And average price of Wiltshire bacon? The Paper. Abroad, at home, infirm or stout, In health, or raving with the gout, Who possibly can do without The Paper? It’s worth and merits then revere, And since to-day begins our year, Think not you e’er can buy too dear The Paper. _The Spirit of the Public Journals_, 1823. ――――:o:―――― VELLUTI. Heards’t thou not the peacock shriek? Heards’t thou not the cricket squeak? Heards’t thou not the door-hinge creak? No――it was Velluti! Heards’t thou the parrot’s shrilly cry? Heards’t thou the screech-owl hooting by? Heards’t thou the sea-mew screaming nigh? No――it was Velluti! Heards’t thou the angry mastiff growl? Heards’t thou grimalkins midnight howl, And croaking frogs in waters foul? No――it was Velluti! Some there are who mock the song And warblings of the feather’d throng―― But birds and beasts alike belong To thy tones, poor Velluti! For thou art each――first this, then that―― A husky rook, a squeaking rat―― Famed Punch, a frog, a love-sick cat―― These form thy voice, Velluti! _Spirit of the Age Newspaper_, 1828. ――――:o:―――― THE BISHOP AND DON MIGUEL. (A recent correspondence.) Who, false alike in war and peace, Hath nothing done but cheat and fleece, His brother bilk, and rob his niece? My Miguel! Who, on his way to all this evil, In London looked so sweet and civil, In Lisbon pitch’d us to the devil? My Miguel! Whose tyrant deeds e’en roused the spleen Of tyrant-loving Aberdeen To call thee names he didn’t mean My Miguel? Who rules his realm with guns and drums, And sends poor devils to martyrdoms, With “little angels”[25] round their thumbs? My Miguel! Yet, ah! atrocious as thou art, So well thou play’st a monarch’s part, Thou’rt dear unto a bishop’s heart, My Miguel. For thine the sceptre and the purse, And wert thou even ten times worse, To us ’twould matter not a curse, My Miguel. THE ANSWER.