The "European Concert"? Grand! (You recollect that term, man!) _This_ is a Concertina, and It's make is Anglo-German, You can't _expect_ the thing to be English alone, completely; But really, as 'tis played by me. Does it not sound most sweetly? Humph! DONALD CURRIE cocks his nose, BECKETT disdainfully eyes me, My Concertina you would--_close!_ Well, well--you _do_ surprise me! * * * * * WEEK BY WEEK. Scarcely a day passes without bringing us nearer to the end of the year. That is a melancholy reflection, but we are not sure that it exhausts all the possibilities of misery latent in the flight of time. It has been noticed, for instance, that the Duke of X----, whose sporting proclivities are notorious, never fails to celebrate his birthday with a repast at an inferior _restaurant_, and, as His Grace is powerful, his friends suffer in silence and bewail his increasing ducal age. * * * * * Henley Regatta came off as arranged. This is a peculiarity which is very striking in connection with this Royal fixture. We are informed that several certainties were upset, but by whom and why has not been stated. Candidly speaking, such a brutal method as "upsetting" consorts ill with the softer manners of our time. On the Thames, too, it must be extraordinarily disagreeable. * * * * * Mrs. WEEDLE, the Hon. Mrs. THREADBARE, and Lady FAWN, have joined the lately established Bureau for the Dissemination of Fashionable Friendships. The Personal Advertising Department is now open, and is daily filled with a distinguished crowd of applicants. Arrangements are in process of completion for supplying the deserving rich with cambric handkerchiefs, and imitation diamonds, at nominal prices. * * * * * A well-known Actor has lately been deprived of his customary allowance of fat. His loss of weight (in avoirdupois) has been computed at five-sixteenths of the integral cubit of a patent accumulator's vertical boiling power, divided by the fractional resistance of a plate-glass window to a two-horse-power catapult. * * * * * The weather has been variable, with cryptoconchoidal deflections of a solid reverberating isobar previously tested in a solution of zinc and soda-water. This indicates cold weather in December next. * * * * * Consols 1/50094th better. Wheat in demand. Jute firm. Bank rate too fast to last. * * * * * A Politician, whose name has been frequently mentioned during the late crisis, has stated it as his opinion that a temperance orator's powers of persuasion are to a moral victory as a Prime Minister is to a willow-pattern dinner-plate. The remark caused much excitement in the lobby, where this gentleman's humorous sallies never lack appreciators. * * * * *