_Stoach._ What! the Leader of the House bring in this Purity Bill!! Why I saw him myself with my own eyes in a toy-shop, all among the toys, alone at one in the morning with an attractive young person of the female persuasion. "Look at that now," says an Irish M.P., following the example of _Shaun the Post_ in _The Colleen Bawn_, when the scoundrelly lawyer brings a charge against the hero of the drama, "An' what might _you_ be doin' about there at that same time?" Supposing, for an instant, the impossible, _Stoach_ would be called to order, and be severely reprimanded by the SPEAKER. Had the much-heckled and long-suffering _Clivebrooke_ been gifted by the Author with lively ready-wit, he would have replied to his father and supporters, who invade his room, in the pleasantest and Charliest-Wyndhamest manner, "Yes (_lightly and airily_). What could I be doing in a toy-shop with a young lady? Why (_still more lightly and airily_) of course I was '_toying with her!_'" Whereupon his old father would have been immensely tickled, and the deputation, in fits of laughter, would have rushed back to the lobby to report "the last good thing said by that clever chap _Clivebrooke!_ So like him!" This Act would have ended with the triumph of ready-wit over disappointed malignity. _Jessie Keber_ would have run in and embraced her hero, the Bill would have been carried (_Cheers heard without_), and all would have ended happily and pleasantly without any necessity having arisen for another Act, either of Parliament or of the piece. "Yes," says this dramatist, "I admit the soft impeachment. I plead guilty, with extenuating circumstances. _The play's the thing_; and if the facts don't suit my play, so much the worse for the facts. Success has been achieved, and what more can any living author want? Credit and cash. _Voila tout!_ 'Credit' for my own original invention in hitting upon the Parliamentary accessories to my picture; and 'cash,' which will be paid as long as the public take an interest _in_ the play, and just so long shall I take my interest _out_ of the public money." To sum up in the words of the old-fashioned tag, "If our friends in front are pleased, then Manager and Author are satisfied." But, if objection be still taken to the unreality of the Parliamentary setting of the picture, then "please remember," apologises 'ENRY HAUTHOR, "that '_it's only my play_.'" * * * * * A Liberator Lay. Three little roguey-boys said to Conscience--"Pooh!" Croydon made one its Mayor, and then there were two. Two little roguey-boys thought that Fraud was fun; A Judge thought otherwise, and then there was one. One little roguey-boy took the Chiltern Hun- dreds upon his road to Spain, and then there was none! * * * * *