_Aunty Rose._ "AND HOW OLD DO YOU THINK _I_ AM, TOMMY?" _Tommy._ "WELL--SIXTY-THREE?" _Aunty Rose._ "OH, YOU FLATTERER! WHY, I'M PAST EIGHTY!" _Tommy._ "AH! I _THOUGHT_ YOU WERE; BUT I THOUGHT YOU WOULDN'T LIKE ME TO _SAY_ SO, YOU KNOW."] * * * * * TROUBLES IN MADAGASCAR.--Not by any means at an end. Most probably all "Hova" again. * * * * * HANWELLIA'S ANSWER. (_See "Punch," September 22._) So, my friend, you ask me questions; well, I'll give you tit for tat: I'm a matrimonial cormorant connected with a bat. But I stirred my stumps and wandered through the wicket of the jail, While the umpire leg-befored me as a prisoner on bail. What a sight for sunny snowballs! ah, my heart beat fast and loud When once more I mingled freely with the logarithmic crowd: And on either side the cube-roots cast the falsehood in the teeth Of the oyster I had bearded on his own, his native, heath. It was splendid, but I fancy that they came it rather strong When a saucy capercailzie played sonatas on a gong. If his music was so naughty, his behaviour was so nice, That I laughed to see him gaily cutting capers on the ice. Then the band struck up in earnest, though their leader murmured "play"; And at first they played ta-ra-ra, but without the boom-de-ay. Then they captured a canal-boat, and with half-a-dozen bars Beating time they smashed the record from Mashonaland to Mars. [Illustration] Fifty tunes they played serenely, but I didn't seem to care, For my Aunt had said "ELIZA, when the band plays I'll be there; I'll be there with Uncle RUFUS who has got to go because---- Well the reason doesn't matter, he'll be there," and there he was. If the stars drink champagne-cider out of tankards to the dregs, All the stars and little starlings with the garters on their legs, Shall an undiscovered cornet with a mile or two of tail Be put off with half a gallon of our humble home-brewed ale? No, by Jove, he wouldn't stand it; he can let the others pay; Standing treat is out of fashion, so he'll tap the milky way. When the red-hot stars come trickling he can cool them in his cup, And he'll tap it all the harder just to keep his pecker up. He can hang about the Strand, too, if we give him lots of rope, And he'll lather SEMOLINA with a sud of patent soap; SEMOLINA, you remember, took her passage on a hoy, She was married to an anchorite and now she's got a boy. Parish Councillors came round her, Dukes and Earls, and even Barts; With their spades they carved allotments on the table-land of Herts; But she faced them in her fury, and she asked the idiots how She could ever stomach acres after eating up her cow?