Yes!  Perhaps, indeed, ’twere kinder,
    Had he ne’er relaxed his track;
  He’ll return, that grinning grinder,
    Reinvigorated, back! 
  Then, as I remarked before, a
    Spell of doom for me remains,
  With “Selections from Dinorah,”
    And his other worse refrains.

* * * * *

WHY I DON’T GO OUT OF TOWN, FOR THE AUTUMN?—­Because I’ve been pretty well everywhere, but always quite well in London.

* * * * *

[Illustration:  BRIC A BRAC.

Lady Croesus.  “OH, WHAT A SWEET TABLE!  WHERE DID YOU GET IT, MY DEAR?  OH, I SEE HERE’S THE MAN’S CARD.” (Spelling the label.) “‘TABLE—­LOUIS QUINZE.’  LOUIS QUINZEY!  WHAT A HORRID NAME!  AND WHY HASN’T HE PUT HIS ADDRESS?”]

* * * * *

THE GERMAN WATERS.

  A promenade with tongues alive
    That every phrase of OLLENDORFF use;
  And “Luther’s Hymn” at half-past five
    To drag you from the arms of Morpheus;
  Fat Germans in their awful “Fracks,”
    Pale Frenchmen, too, a bit decolletes,
  And dapper Britons with attacks
    Of livers and digestions faulty.

  A garden fair with “Quellen” foul—­
    Ach, Himmel!  How they taste those “Quellen”! 
  Then rolls and coffee, next a prowl
    Among the shops with JANE or ELLEN;
  The mid-day meal at table d’hote,
    All windows closed—­a climate hellish!—­
  With dishes too crackjaw to quote,
    And sometimes difficult to relish.

  An afternoon of drowsy drives—­
    How these poor foreigners love driving
  To places where, when one arrives,
    There’s nought for which it’s worth arriving!—­
  A “Belvedere”—­like Primrose Hill,
     A “Gartenhaus,” tobacco-scented;
  Yet there they smoke, and moon, and swill,
    Quite adipose, and self-contented.

  A “Kursaal,” very large, and fine;
    A Theatre, small, and shabby-splendid;
  More beer, more music, ditto wine
    (This latter can be much commended). 
  The Military (each salutes!)
    With HANNCHEN on their arm or MARIE;
  I wonder where they get those boots—­
    I mean, of course, the Military.

  Lawn-Tennis and an “English Club,”
    Frequented now by Lords and Princes,
  Where every snobling likes to rub
    His elbows with a Peer, who winces;
  The tittle-tattle of the cliques,
    Some half-proposals for our daughters—­
  Such is the life that makes for weeks
    A fortune—­for the German Waters!

* * * * *

CHOOSING HIS WORDS.

(MADE IN GERMANY.)