(_Sad Story of a Victim of "D----d Iteration."_) _Tum-tum-tum-tiddle-um-tum-tum!_ 'Tis ground out twelve times over!! My nerves all twitch, my brain seems numb, Faith! I'm a music-lover; But that infernal organ-grind, With hideous iteration, Is driving me out of my mind, Into sheer desperation. _Tum-tum-tum-tiddle-um-tum-tum!_ _Tum-tum_--O this is maddening! It may be in some gloomy slum, The organ-grinder's gladdening. But to a poor suburban scribe, Intent on scribbling copy, 'Tis torture! Shall I try a bribe? Or seek oblivion's poppy? _Tum-tum-tum-tiddle-um-tum-tum!_ _Tum-tum-tum-tiddle_----Gracious! Those "tums" will split my tympanium, Eternally sequacious. Free country? Bah! When an organ-strain May blast, and blight and bore you, Till you get "tum-tum" on the brain? Ah! There's a picture for you! _Tum-tum-tum-tiddle-um-tum-tum!_-- (The writer, once thought clever, Is now at Hanwell, doomed to hum That hideous tune for ever!) * * * * * A STORY ANENT THE NORTH.--According to the _Dundee Advertiser_, Colonel NORTH has paid cash to the King of the BELGIANS, not for concessions of land near Ostend, but for similar advantages on the Congo. It has been rumoured that the purchase-money was ostensibly (or should it be Ostendsibly?) handed over for the possession of the former, and not the latter. But the rumour must be taken with reserve. Perhaps the report may have arisen from the fact that the Belgian watering-place is situated on the North Sea--a locality naturally associated with the name of the King of the Nitrates. Be this as it may, the gallant Colonel is certain to command the confidence of volunteers in the future as in the past. So far as he is concerned, shares (plough and other varieties) will be as popular as bayonets. * * * * * Stones in Sermons. "Sermons in stones," the poet says; and when Smelfungus scolds, and rails, and girds, and groans at us, We feel that worst of sermonising men Is--throwing stones at us. * * * * * Mrs. R. observes of a respectable young man among her acquaintances, that she was sorry to hear he was incremated in a recent swindling case. * * * * * BIKE _v._ BICYCLE. _Some Tennysonian Bouts-rimés._ [Mr. ERNEST SHIPTON, Secretary of the Cyclists' Touring Club, protests against the term "bike" as being unmitigated slang.] Bike, bike, bike, By your leave, oh C. T. C. Quite too long for my tongue to utter Is "bicycle"--_bike_ for me! O well for the slang-loving boy, That he "bikes" with his sister at play! O well for the lass or lad Who don't Mr. SHIPTON obey! For, in spite of him, "bikes" go on, Thus called, over dale and hill; And "bicycles" soon will be vanished, and The voice of the pedant still.