Mud, sedimentary, coffee-colour, And here a wedge, a sharp, keen, thrustful triangularity, And squares that writhe in painful green, Calling, clamouring--O venerable shade of EUCLID. Back in the ages, dusty, maculated, Across the slate-hued fogs of time, Behold them!--oblongs of sliding water And cubed banks, Bridges and barges, blatantly, wonderfully, inconceivably angular, Calling, clamouring--canal, canal, canal! Out on the sea, restive and sloppy, A waste of salinity, So they aver, There are ships with masts, sails, halyards, Spankers, booms and things; There are lobsters and jellyfish--not here. Nothing here but illimitable mysteries, Baffling unknowledgeableness, Fathomless, fainting from square to square, Oblongs and nosey triangles, ever so nosey, Shapes rhomboidal, perchance rhombohedral--who knows? Puce and mustard-tinted--delicate, Oh, most delicate the mustard!-- And russet, cadaverous pink, They mingle, compaginate, And their voices mingle, They call me out of the frame, They call, Thinly and crazily, Canal, canal, canal--slimy, crawly-crawly water! * * * * * "LITERARY. FREE.--Our 160-page book, 'Hints for Home Decorators,' will be sent free on receipt of 1-1/2d. for postage. Full instructions on painting, staining, graining, varnishing, enamelling, stencilling, gilding, colour-washing, how to mix paints, colours, inks, dyes, and scores of valuable recipes." _Daily Citizen._ Now we know where our novelists get their local colour. * * * * * [Illustration: _Rector_ (_thanking all who have contributed to the success of the bazaar_). "AND AS FOR LADY BLANK, I SHOULD NOT LIKE TO TELL YOU WHAT _SHE_ HAS DONE."] * * * * * THE DEADLY BUTTON. We do not know whether the following incident occurred at Signor BEN TROVATO'S famous restaurant on Fifth Avenue or not, but feel impelled, at any rate, to quote it as a warning, on the authority of _The Globe_ of February 19th, and _The New York American_:-- "Giving a well-satisfied sigh after dinner a Pittsburg man burst a button off his waistcoat. It split in two. One half hit another man, with whom he was dining, in the eye. As a result his _vis-a-vis_ may lose the sight of his eye. The other half struck the convivo in the cheek, cutting the flesh." This new and hitherto unsuspected possibility in ballistics must be rightly directed and also guarded against. There will be danger from the opposite side of the table at City dinners at about the tenth course and onwards, unless the wary guest can screen himself from the Corporation behind a laager of fruit-dishes and substantial ornaments.