"_It was my father's custom, and so it shall be mine!_"-- One seems to hear those simple words 'midst all the show and shine Of the great, gay, white-pillared hall. The gold and silver chains Of deputies and delegates from distant steppes and plains Gleam in the winter daylight. The tall white-tunic'd Guards Stand with drawn swords, Autocracy's serene and stalwart wards. All in the Winter Palace; from regions vast and far They come of many a race and creed to welcome their young Czar. The nobles and the Zemstros, too, are represented here. With tribes of the wild Caucasus, the hosts who love--and fear-- The monarch of one hundred and twenty million souls. And through thine Hall, St. Nicholas, in full firm accents rolls The Voice of armed Autocracy, unbending and unchanged. Unfaltering the youthful eye that boldly roved and ranged Over that motley muster. He lifts his sire's great sword, This youthful heir to power supreme, by freemen much abhorred, But dear to bowing myriads of Slavdom's loyal hosts; And with that calm cold dignity which despotism boasts Establishes the Ego of Autocracy once more. _Voici le sabre de mon sire!_ What ALEXANDER bore Shall NICHOLAS not wear and wield? The appanage of our line! "_It was my father's custom, and so it shall be mine!_" Old rustic song, your refrain long shall echo round our world, Until all burdens from the back of toiling men are hurled. Far, far off day! Now proud and gay Autocracy's strong thralls Muster to-day in fine array in those white-pillared halls. To be--not snubbed, say _reassured_, that Autocrats, still strong, Still give small heed to serfs who plead, to freedom's siren song, Or to "absurd illusions," which, slipped from mouth to mouth, Must still be silenced in the North, if heeded in the South. Those Zemstros voices must be hushed. Autocracy's sole hand Must wield the sabre of his sire, and sway a silent land; The Bear from the new Bearward gentler treatment well may hope, But hardly loosening of the chain or slackening of the rope. The patient Northern Bruin stands and rubs a dubious ear. Amnesty means not Liberty. Autocracy is clear In "firmly and unswervingly," with strength that doth not tire, Holding the mastery of its race, the Sabre of its Sire! * * * * * "MR. PEPYS'S PARISH CHURCH."--The Rev. ALFRED POVAH'S interesting work gives us the origin of the "Navy pew" in St. Olave's. In such a church how appropriate was the old "three-decker," as this structure, which contained clerk below, parson in the middle, and preacher in the topmost compartment, used to be termed. * * * * *