This is really sublime! "No knife!" Can anything exceed the assertion? Nothing but the rejoinder--a rejoinder in which the talented author not only stands proudly forward as a poet, but patriotically proves the _amor propriae_, which has induced him to study the staple manufactures of his beloved country! What but a diligent investigation of the _cut_lerian process could have prompted the illustration of practical knowledge of the Birmingham and Sheffield artificers contained in the following exquisitely explanatory line. But--pray mark the _but_-- "But _scissors_ cut as well as knives!" Sublime announcement! startling information! leading us, by degrees, to the highest of all earthly contemplations, exalting us to fate and her peculiar shears, and preparing us for the exquisitely poetical sequel contained in the following line:-- "And so un_sart_ain's all our lives." Can anything exceed this? The uncertainty of life evidently superinduced the conviction of all other uncertainties, and the sublime poet bears out the intenseness of his impressions by the uncertainty of his spelling! Now, reader, mark the next line, and its context:-- "The very night they were to wed!" Fancy this: the full blossoming of all their budding joys, anticipations, death, and hope's accomplishment, the crowning hour of their youth's great bliss, "_the very night they were to wed_," is, with _extra syncretic_ skill, chosen as the awful one in which "Fate's scissors cut Giles Scroggins' thread!" Now, reader, do you see the subtle use of practical knowledge? Are you convinced of the impotent prescription from _knives_ only? Can you not perceive in "_Fate's scissors_" a parallel for the unthought-of host "that bore the mighty wood of Dunsinane against the blood-stained murderer of the pious Duncan?" Does not the fatal truth rush, like an unseen draught into rheumatic crannies, slick through your soul's perception? Are you not prepared for this--_to be resumed in our next_? * * * * * THE NEW ADMINISTRATION. FROM OUR OWN COURT CIRCULAR. Lord Lyndhurst is to have the seals; but it is not yet decided who is to be entrusted with the wafer-stamps. Gold-stick has not been appointed, and there are so many of the Conservatives whose qualities peculiarly fit them for the office of _stick_, that the choice will be exceedingly embarrassing. Though the Duke of Wellington does not take office, an extra chair has been ordered, to allow of his having a seat in the Cabinet. And though Lord Melbourne is no longer minister, he is still to be indulged with a lounge on the sofa. If the Duke of Beaufort is to be Master of the Horse, it is probable that a new office will be made, to allow Colonel Sibthorp to take office as Comptroller of the Donkeys: and it is said that Horace Twiss is to join the administration as Clerk of the Kitchen.