(_Quintus Horatius Flaccus loquitur._) Maecenas sprang from royal line, You spring a Line diurnal. (Perhaps my joke is drawn too fine For readers of your journal.) But what I started out to say, Across the gulf of ages, Is that, in our old Roman day, My patron paid me wages. No barren wreath of fame was mine When Mac approved my stuff, But casks of good Falernian wine, And slaves and gold enough. And last, to keep the wolf away And guard my age from harm, He gave me in his princely way My little Sabine farm. But now, forsooth, your merry crew-- _O Tempora! O Mores!_-- What do they ever get from you-- Your Laura, Pan, Dolores? They fill the Line with verse and wheeze, To them your fame is due. What do they ever get for these? Maecenas? Ha! Ha! _You?_ So as I quaff my spectral wine, At ease beside the Styx, Would I contribute to the Line? Nequaquam! Nunquam! Nix! Campion. * * * Our compliments to Old Man Flaccus, whose witty message reminds us to entreat contribs to be patient, as we are snowed under with offerings. For a week or more we have been trying to horn into the column with some verses of our own composing. * * * BRIGHT SAYINGS OF MOTHER. My respected father came to breakfast on New Year's Day remarking that he had treated himself to a present by donning a new pair of suspenders, whereupon mother remarked: "Well braced for the New Year, as it were!" C. T. S. * * * After some years of editing stories of events in high society, a gentleman at an adjacent desk believes he has learned the chief duty of a butler. It is to call the police. * * * "THAT STRAIN AGAIN--IT HAD A DYING SNORT." Sir: Speaking of soft music and the pearly gates, S. T. Snortum is owner and demonstrator of the music store at St. Peter, Minnesota. S. W. E. * * * Warren, O., has acquired a lady barber, and dinged if her name isn't Ethel Gillette. * * * No doubt the Manistee News-Advocate has its reason for running the "hogs received" news under the heading "Hotel Arrivals." * * * "I see by an announcement by the Columbia Mills that window shades are down," communicates W. H. B. "Can it be that the Columbia Mills people are ashamed of something?" Mebbe. Or perhaps they are fixing prices. * * * "For the lovamike," requests the Head Scene-Shifter, "keep the Admirable Crichton out of the Column. We have twenty-five presses, and it takes a guard at each press to prevent it from appearing Admiral Crichton." * * * Pittsburgh Shriners gave a minstrel show the other night, and the inspired reporter for the Post mentions that "an intermission separated the two parts and broke the monotony."