And yet, a modest competence My pensive mood provides, My sentiments--like specimens On microscopic slides-- When I on woven paper fair, In woven words illume, I make a kind of subtle, rare, And Esoteric Boom! * * * * * POLICE CHARGE AGAINST EXCITED THROGMORTONIAN JOBBER.--"He jobbed me in the eye." * * * * * [Illustration: IN THE VESTRY. _Minister_ (_who has exchanged pulpits--to Minister's Man_). "DO YOU COME BACK FOR ME AFTER TAKING UP THE BOOKS?" _Minister's Man._ "OU AY, SIR, I COMES BACK FOR YE, AND YE FOLLOWS ME AT A RESPECTFUL DISTANCE!"] * * * * * A BYE-ELECTION LAY. (_By a disappointed Western Wire-puller._) After a conflict such as this, Some moralising's due; And we in Bristol of the fight Can take a "bird's-eye" view. The poll we cannot truly call The pleasantest of pills; It's really rather sad our "won'ts" Should come so near our "WILLS." Yet there's some comfort in the fact, Some salve for spirits sore, That Bristol nobly has not shrunk From spilling of its "GORE." * * * * * A BALFOURIAN QUERY.--"No possibility of any return to the shareholders," was, in the _Pall Mall Gazette_, the heading of a report of a meeting of the members of the "Liberator Company." What! no possibility of _any_ return? Yes, surely, the return of JABEZ. But even then--_cui bono?_ or Cui Buenos Ayres? Who of the unfortunate losers would not far rather get back something than get back somebody, and that somebody JABEZ. * * * * * THE EARLY BIRD.--Mr. GOSLING, British Minister, has demanded an indemnity from the Nicaraguans of £15,000 for the expulsion of Mr. HATCH, British Vice-Consul at Bluefields. GOSLING is no goose, that's clear. He offers the Nicaragamuffins a Hatch-way out of the difficulty of their own making. * * * * * OUR BOOKING-OFFICE.