Young gentlemen with large mustachios and small incomes will find the MATRIMONIAL AGENCY OFFICE well worthy their attention; and young ladies who play the piano, speak French, and measure only eighteen inches round the waist, cannot better consult their own interests than by making an early application.

N.B.  None with red hair need apply, unless with a mother’s certificate that it was always considered to be auburn.

Wanted several buxom widows for the commencement.  If in weeds, will be preferred.

* * * * *

“MATTERS IN FACT,” AND “MATTERS IN LAW.”

“Law is the perfection of reason!” said, some sixty years ago, an old powder-wigged priest of Themis, in his “enthusymusy” for the venerable lady; and what one of her learned adorers, from handsome Jock Campbell down to plain Counsellor Dunn, would dare question the maxim?  A generous soul, who, like the fabled lady of the Arabian tale, drops gold at every word she utters, varying in value from one guinea to five thousand, according to the quality of the hand that is stretched forth to receive it, cannot possibly be other than reason herself.  But to appreciate this dear creature justly, it is absolutely necessary to be in her service.  No ordinary lay person can judge her according to her deserts.  You must be initiated into her mysteries before you can detect her beauties; but once admitted to her august presence—­once enrolled as her sworn slave—­your eyes become opened and clear, and you see her as she is, the marvel of the world.  Yet, though so difficult of comprehension, no man, nor woman, nor child, must plead ignorance of her excellencies.  To be ignorant of any one of them is an impossibility as palpable as that “the Queen can do no wrong,” or any other admirable fiction which the genius of our ancestors has bequeathed us.  We all must know the law, or be continually whipped!  A hard rule, though an inflexible one.  But the schoolmaster is abroad—­PUNCH, that teaches all, must teach the law; and, as a preliminary indispensable, he now proceeds to give a few definitions of the principal matters contained in that science, which bear a different meaning from what they would in ordinary language.  The admiring neophyte will perceive with delight the vast superiority apparent in all cases of “matters of law,” or “matters of fact.”

To illustrate:—­When a lovely girl, all warmth and confidence, steals on tiptoe from her lonely chamber, and, lighted by the moon, when “pa’s” asleep, drops from the balcony into the arms of some soft youth, as warm as she, who has been waiting to whisk her off to Hymen’s altar—­that is generally understood as

[Illustration:  AN ATTACHMENT IN FACT.]

When an ugly “bum,” well up to trap, creeps like a rascal from the sheriff’s-office, and with his capias armed, ere you are half-dressed, gives you the chase, and, as you “leg” away for the bare life, his knuckles dig into the seat of your unmentionables, gripping you like a tiger—­that indeed is une autre chose, that is