"O! a' ye flocks, owre a' the hills By mosses, meadows, moors and fells. Come join your counsels and your skills To cowe the lairds. And get the brutes the power themsels _To choose their herds!_" * * * * * "AND A GOOD JUDGE, TOO!" There is a good Justice named GRANTHAM, Who tells lawyers truths that should haunt 'em. There are seeds of reform In his speech, wise as warm, And long may he flourish--to plant 'em! * * * * * STRANGE BUT TRUE.--When does a Husband find his Wife out? When he finds her at home and she doesn't expect him. * * * * * THE TRAVELLING COMPANIONS. NO. XXVI. SCENE--_On the Lagoons. CULCHARD and PODBURY's gondola is nearing Venice. The apricot-tinted diaper on the façade of the Ducal Palace is already distinguishable, and behind its battlements the pearl-grey summits of the domes of St. Mark's shimmer in the warm air. CULCHARD and PODBURY have hardly exchanged a sentence as yet. The former has just left off lugubriously whistling as much as he can remember of "Che faro," the latter is still humming "The Dead March in Saul," although in a livelier manner than at first._ _Culch._ Well, my dear PODBURY, our--er--expedition has turned out rather disastrously! _Podb._ (_suspending the Dead March, chokily_). Not much mistake about _that_--but there, it's no good talking about it. Jolly that brown and yellow sail looks on the fruit-barge there. See? [Illustration: "Reads with a gradually lengthening countenance."] _Culch._ (_sardonically_). Isn't it a little late in the day to be cultivating an eye for colour? I was about to say that those two girls have treated us infamously. I say deliberately, my dear PODBURY, _infamously_! _Podb._ Now drop it, CULCHARD, do you hear? I won't hear a word against either of them. It serves us jolly well right for not knowing our own minds better--though I no more dreamed that old BOB would--Oh, hang it, I can't talk about it yet! _Culch._ That's childishness, my dear fellow; you _ought_ to talk about it--it will do you good. And really, I'm not at all sure, after all, that we have not both of us had a fortunate escape. One is very apt to--er--overrate the fascinations of persons one meets abroad. Now, neither of those two was _quite_-- _Podb._ (_desperately_). Take care! I swear I'll pitch you out of this gondola, unless you stop that jabber! _Culch._ (_with wounded dignity_). I am willing to make great allowances for your state of mind, PODBURY, but such an expression as--as _jabber_, applied to my--er--well-meant attempts at consolation, and just as I was about to propose an arrangement--really, it's _too_ much! The moment we reach the hotel, I will relieve you from any further infliction from (_bitterly_) what you are pleased to call my "jabber!"