O Muscovite, blind in your wrath, with your heel on the Israelite’s neck, And your hand on that baleful old blade, Persecution, ’twere wisdom to reck The PHARAOH’S calm warning.  Beware!  Lo, the Pyramids pierce the grey gloom Of a desert that is but a waste, by a river that is but a tomb, Yet the Hebrew abides and is strong.  AMENEMAN is gone to the ghosts, He the prince of the Coptic police who so harried the Israelite hosts When their lives with hard-bondage were bitter.  And now bitter bondage you’d try.  Proscription, and exile, and stern deprivation.  Beware, Sire!  Put by That blade in its blood-rusted scabbard.  The PHARAOHS, the CAESARS have found That it wounds him who wields it; and you, though your victim there, prone on the ground, Look helpless and hopeless, you also shall find Persecution a bane Which shall lead to a Red Sea of blood to o’erwhelm selfish Tyranny’s train.  “Beware!” Tis the shade of MENEPTHA that whispers the warning from far.  Concerning that sword there’s a lesson the PHARAOH may teach to the TSAR!
     * * * * *

“REWARDS FOR GALLANTRY.”—­Among the numerous rewards mentioned in the Times of last Thursday, the magnificent gold watch, with monogram in diamonds, presented by the Royal Italian Opera Company to AUGUSTUS DRURIOLANUS at the close of the present exceptionally successful season, was not mentioned.  Most appropriate present from the persons up to tune to one who is always up to time.  The umble individual who writes this paragraph only wishes some company—­Italian, French, no matter which—­would present him with a golden and diamonded watch.  “O my prophetic soul!  My Uncle!!”

* * * * *

THE PRICE OF IT.

  GLADSTONE’S latest Benedicite
  Is bestowed on “free publicity.” 
  ’Tis the thing that we all strive at,
  Praise in speech, and hate—­in private! 
  Where are pride, reserve, simplicity? 
  Fled for ever—­from Publicity!

* * * * *

“MORE LIGHT!”—­The Berners Hotel Co., with Mr. GEORGE AUGUSTUS SALA as Chairman, should at once be advertised as “The G.A.S.-Berners Hotel Co.,” and, of course, no electric lighting would be used.  Mr. SIMS REEVES is also a Director of this Hotel Company.  So it starts with a tenner.

* * * * *

Socialistic Military Novel.  By JAMES ODD SUMMER. One Iron Soldier, and the Led Captain.

[Illustration:  FROM THE NILE TO THE NEVA.

SHADE OF PHARAOH.  “FORBEAR!  THAT WEAPON ALWAYS WOUNDS THE HAND THAT
WIELDS IT.”]

* * * * *

MR. PUNCH’S MORAL MUSIC-HALL DRAMAS.

No.  XII.—­CONRAD; OR, THE THUMBSUCKER.

(Adapted freely from a well-known Poem in the “Struwwelpeter.")

CHARACTERS.

Conrad (aged 6).  Conrad’s Mother (47).  The Scissorman (age immaterial).