“THERE’S PIPPINS AND CHEESE—TO COME.” Pippins! Does not the word, upon a tombstone, conjure up thoughts of Hesperian gardens—of immortal trees, laden with golden fruit; with delicious produce, the growth of a soil where not one useless weed takes root, where no baneful snake rustles among the grass, where no blight descends, no canker withers? Where we may pluck from the consenting boughs, and eat, and eat—and never, as in earthly things, find a worm at the core, a rottenness at the heart, where outside beauty tempted us to taste? “There’s pippins _to come_!” The evil and misery gathered with the apple of death will be destroyed—forgotten—by the ambrosial fruit to be plucked for ever in immortal orchards!— “THERE’S PIPPINS AND CHEESE—TO COME!” What a picture of plenty in its most beneficent aspect—what a prospect of pastoral abundance! Think of it, ye oppressed of the earth! Ye, who are bowed and pinched by want—ye, who are scourged by the hands of persecution—ye, crushed with misery—ye, doomed to the bitterness of broken faith; take this consolation to your wearied souls—apply this balsam to your bruised hearts.—Though all earth be to you as barren as the sands— “THERE’S PIPPINS AND CHEESE—TO COME!” ------------------------------------------------------------------------ [Illustration] BULLY BOTTOM’S BABES THE immortal weaver of Athens hath a host of descendants. They are scattered throughout every country of the world, their moral likeness to their sage ancestor becoming stronger in the land of wealth and luxury. They are a race marked and distinguished by the characteristics of their first parent—omnivorous selfishness and invulnerable self-complacency. They wear the ass’s head, yet know it not; and heedless of the devotion, have the Titania fortune still to round their temples “with coronets of fresh and fragrant flowers.” They sleep to the watching of an enamoured fairy, and wake only to new experiences of her tenderness and beauty. “Be kind and courteous to this gentleman; Hop in his walks, and gambol in his eyes; Feed him with apricocks and dewberries; With purple grapes, green figs, and mulberries The honey-bags steal from the humble-bees, And for night-tapers crop their waxen thighs, And light them at the fiery glow-worm’s eyes, To have my love to bed and to arise: And pluck the wings from painted butterflies, To fan the moonbeams from his sleeping eyes: Nod to him, elves, and do him courtesies.”