CONS BY OUR OWN COLONEL. Why is a loud laugh in the House of Commons like Napoleon Buonaparte?--Because it's an _M.P. roar_ (an Emperor). Why is a person getting rheumatic like one locking a cupboard-door?--Because he's turning _achy_ (a key). Why is one-and-sixpence like an aversion to coppers?--Because it's _hating pence_ (eighteen-pence). * * * * * PUNCH'S THEATRE. DIE HEXEN AM RHEIN; OR, RUDOLPH OF HAPSBURGH. Mysterious are thy ways, O Yates! Thou art the only true melodramatist of the stage and off the stage! When a new demonology is compiled thou shalt have an honourable place in it. Thou shall be worshipped as the demon of novelty, even by the "gods" themselves. Thy deeds shall be recorded in history. It shall not be forgotten that thou wert the importer of Mademoiselle Djeck, the tame elephant; of Monsieur Bohain, the gigantic Irishman; and of Signor Hervi o'Nano, the Cockneyan-Italian dwarf. Never should we have seen the Bayaderes but for you; nor T.P. Cooke in "The Pilot," nor the Bedouin Arabs, nor "The Wreck Ashore," nor "bathing and sporting" nymphs, nor other dramatic delicacies. Truly, thou art the luckiest of managers; for all thy efforts succeed, whether they deserve it or not. Sometimes thou drawest up an army of scene-painters, mechanists, dancers, monsters, dwarfs, devils, fire-works, and water-spouts, in terrible array against common sense. Yet lo! thou dost conquer! Thy pieces never miss fire; they go on well with the public, and favourable are the press reports. Wert thou a Catholic thou wouldest be canonised; for evil spirits are thy passion; the Vatican itself cannot produce a more indefatigable "devils' advocate!" The repast now provided by Mr. Yates for those who are fond of "supping full of horrors" is a devilled drama, interspersed with hydraulics-- consisting, in fact, of spirits and water, sweetened with songs and spiced with witches. It is, we are informed by the official announcements, "a romantic burletta of witchcraft, in two acts, and a prologue, with entirely new scenery, dresses, and peculiar appointments, _imagined_ by, and introduced under the direction of, Mr. Yates." Now, any person, entirely unprejudiced with a taste for devilry and free from hydrophobia, who sees this production, must have an unbounded opinion of the manager's imagination,--what a head he must have for aquatic effects! In vain we look around for its parallel--nothing but the New River head suggests itself.