Now strike the clashing cymbals, and sound the big bassoon, The Loyal Pride of Fishponds Lodge has left the old "Full Moon," Yet, though their band be warlike, they mean nor war nor pillage, 'Tis charity that bids them thus perambulate the village. No member of the Order would dare to come too late When Fishponds calls her Druids out to celebrate a _fête_. Then, while with martial music, the left foot on the beat, The Lodge awakes the echoes loud in every village street, The villagers of Fishponds forsake their early bed, And each one at his window displays a nightcapped head, Salutes the hoary Druids, nor fails to greet with cheers, The Mangotsfield detachment of Bristol Volunteers. * * * * * A Correspondent writes to the _Scotsman_, protesting against the omission of the grey plover from the list of birds to be protected under the Wild Birds Protection Act. "That the eggs," he adds, "are gathered by keepers and others for sale, should certainly be no argument; and any keeper might well be ashamed to watch a poor harmless bird all day through binoculars for the purpose of making a few shillings by the sale of its eggs." We live and learn. I have been eating plover's eggs for years without the least suspicion that the poor harmless mother-bird had been shamefully watched through binoculars by a keeper in search of shillings. All the same. I heartily indorse the suggestion that the plover should be protected. * * * * * SIR DONALD CURRIE must have the eye of an eagle. Speaking at a luncheon held in Newcastle the other day in connection with the Trinity Presbyterian Church, he declared that "nothing had ever charmed him more than to observe at the luncheon that day the marvellous ability, but much more the marvellous unanimity and Christian fellowship manifested by the Nonconformist bodies." I doff my cap to the man who can infer not only marvellous unanimity and Christian fellowship, but also marvellous ability from his observation of bodies at luncheon. After this it must be the merest child's-play to navigate the _Tantallon Castle_ to the Baltic Canal. * * * * * At a recent meeting of the Blackrock Town Commissioners, so I gather from the _Freeman's Journal_, Dr. KOUGH, the Vice-Chairman, objected to the adoption of a petition in favour of the Intoxicating Liquors (Ireland) Bill. He said the petition had been carried by a side-wind. Obviously, in the Doctor's opinion, the only thing to be done was to Kough-drop it. * * * * * THE ASCENT OF MAN. ["Professor DRUMMOND'S 'Ascent of Man' was discussed in the Assembly of the Free Church and very severely handled."--_Daily Telegraph._] What? Sprung frae an ape wi' a danglin' bit tailie? Evolved by a process o' naiteral law? What? Me, Sir? An Elder i' Kirk an' a Bailie? That boast o' the bluid o' the Yellow Macaw?