* * * * * ~Bingham on Rome.~ "Talk to me at this time of day about Borne being the Mother of Arts!" cries Mr. BUNCOMBE BINGHAM, M.C. PUNCHINELLO fervently hopes that at no time of the day will anybody ever talk to BINGHAM about Borne being the Mother of Arts. The reason therefor is obvious. "Why, sir," says BINGHAM, "there is more of that genius which makes even the marble itself wear the divine beauty of life, more of that power to-day in living America, than was ever dreamed of in Rome, living or dead!" We think we hear BINGHAM exclaim, with the gladiator-like championship of Art for which he is renowned--"Bring on your MICHAEL ANGELOS; produce your CHIAROSCUROS, your MASANIELLOS, your SAVONAROLAS and the rest of 'em--but show me a match for VINNIE REAM!" * * * * * [Illustration: ~PERSIFLAGE.~ Jenkins (_Chaffing glazier, who is mending basement window_.) "NOW, MY FRIEND, TRY TO GET OUT THAT WAY. YOU KNOW YOU MUST HAVE BEEN PUT IN FOR _something_, AND YOU'LL ONLY AGGRAVATE MATTERS IF YOU TRY TO BREAK JAIL."] * * * * * ~Chinopathy.~ Did the gentleman who threw a brick at a dog on a very hot day (when no doubt that inoffensive animal was in a stew) imagine that he had hit upon the whole of the common Chinese _materia medica?_ PUNCHINELLO is gravely told that a Celestial doctor is about to come to New York, whose favorite prescriptions, in accordance with Chinese practice, "will be baked clay-dust, similar to brick-dust and dog-soup." In one of these remedies the medical acumen of PUNCHINELLO recognizes a homoeopathic principle. Man having been made out of the dust of the earth, nothing is so well adapted to cure him as baked clay. Every man's house is now not only his castle, but his apothecary shop. A brick may be considered a panacea, and may be carried in the hat. Taken internally, it will go to the building up of the system. Applied to the head it is good for fractures. Dog-soup has an evident advantage over the usual prescriptions of Bark. * * * * * ~Greek Meeting Greek.~ We learn that "a naval architect named DUNKIN claims to have constructed a new style of vessel, impervious to rams, shell, or shot." Now, then, where is our friend, Captain ERICSSON? The Captain has a torpedo which he is anxious to explode, near a strong vessel belonging to somebody else. He says it will blow up anything. DUNIN says nothing can blow up his vessel. A contest between these very positive inventors would be a positive luxury--to those who had nothing to risk. We bet on the torpedo. * * * * * ~The "New Muscle".~ It was a mere joke, that stuff about the "new muscle in the human body," said to have been found by an English anatomist. It simply meant that, the Oyster Months being past, the "human body" begins to be nourished with soft-shell clams. * * * * *