[Illustration]

C’s.  M. (falling at his feet). Say, CONRAD, you will some day pardon me?

Con. (bitterly, as he regards his maimed hands.) I will,—­the day these pollards send forth shoots!

[His Mother turns aside with a heartbroken wail; CONRAD standing apart in gloomy estrangement as the Curtain descends.

[Illustration:  “RUNNING HIS EYE OVER THEM”.

Colonel North and Lord Dunraven. “COME ALONG WITH US, GRANDOLPH.  WE’VE GOT A BETTER LOT THAN THAT.”]

“RUNNING HIS EYE OVER THEM.”

  GRANDOLPH muses:—­“My Kingdom for a horse!”
  Ah, well! 
  The question is,—­which is my Kingdom? 
  I’m bound to own there is a spell
  In Turfdom, Stabledom, and Ringdom,
  The spell that Lord GEORGE BENTICK knew,
  As DIZZY tells, I feel it too.

  He won brief leadership, who might
  Have won the Derby!  Which was better? 
  There’s rapture in a racer’s flight,
  There’s rust on the official fetter. 
  Of me the Press tells taradiddles! 
  Well, I do set the fools strange riddles!

  “Fourth Party!” He was no bad start
  For a new stable, but he’s done with. 
  “Tory Democracy!” No heart! 
  But ’tis a mount I’ve had good fun with. 
  “Leader!” “Economy!” “Sobriety!”
  My Stable has not lacked variety.

  What does NORTH say?  A ragged lot? 
  Try a new string?  And you, DUNRAVEN? 
  Humph!  Fancy does blow cold and hot. 
  Audacious now, and now half craven. 
  Well, freak’s an unexhausted fount. 
  Mentor, can you guess my next mount?

[Illustration:  A CAREFUL MAN.

Host. “HULLO!  WATERING MY CHAMPAGNE!  AFRAID OF ITS GETTING INTO YOUR HEAD, I SUPPOSE?”

Guest. “No!  IT’S NOT MY HEAD I’M AFRAID OF WITH YOUR CHAMPAGNE!”]

* * * * *

MY PITHY JAYNE.

[DR. JAYNE, Bishop of Chester, at a Conference of the Girl’s Friendly Society, at Chester, said that until they were prepared to introduce basket-making into London Society as a substitute for quadrilles and waltzes, he was not disposed to accept it as an equivalent for balls and dances among girls of other classes.]

AIR.—­“My Pretty Jane.”

My pithy JAYNE, my plucky JAYNE, Punch fancies you looked sly When you met them, met them down at Chester, And gave them “one in the eye.”  Bigotry’s waning fast, my boy, But Cant we sometimes hear, And Chester cant is pestilent cant, My Lord, that’s pretty clear.  Then pithy JAYNE, my plucky JAYNE, Of smiting don’t be shy; But meet them, meet the moonstruck Puritans And tell them it’s all my eye.

  ’Tis only play, and harmless play,
  Like kissing in the ring,
  When lads and lasses of spirits gay