Periodicals Books

ANOTHER RURAL CONFERENCE. [A Church Dignitary, writing to The Globe, suggests that the rural reform most urgently needed is a better postal system in the shires.] Radical Reformer (meeting Rural Labourer tramping to London). Yours is a typical case, my man. You are a victim of our insensate Land Laws, or exploded Feudalism. No doubt you are leaving the country because you could not find employment... more...

OUR SHAKSPEARIAN CORRESPONDENCE. We have received from a valued and kind correspondent (not one of those emphatically good-natured friends so wittily described by Sheridan) the following temperate remonstrance against the tone which has distinguished several of our recent articles on Shakspeare:— Shakspeare Suggestions (Vol. viii., pp. 124. 169.).— "Most busy, when least I do." I am... more...

CHAPTER I. "This is the seventy-fifth pair! Pretty well for us in so short a time!" said the Colonel's wife. "Yes, but we must give Aunt Marian the credit of a very large proportion; at least ten pairs have come from her." "I have nothing to do but to knit; none to knit for at home but my cat," I replied, rather shortly, to the soft voice that had given me credit for such... more...

'ARRY ON EQUALITY. Dear Charlie,—Bin down as a dab with that dashed heppydemick, dear boy. I 'ave bloomin' nigh sneezed my poor head orf. You know that there specie of toy Wot they call cup-and-ball! That's me, Charlie! My back seemed to open and shut, As the grippe-demon danced on my innards, and played pitch-and-toss with my nut. Hinfluenza be blowed! It licks hague and cholera... more...

ENGLISH OPINION ON THE AMERICAN WAR. The great events which took place in the United States between the first election of President Lincoln and the accession of President Johnson excited an amount of party-spirit in England greater than I recollect in connection with any other non-English occurrences, and fairly proportionate even to that supreme form of party-spirit which the same events produced in... more...

THE FRUITS OF FREE LABOR IN THE SMALLER ISLANDS OF THE BRITISH WEST INDIES.   The emancipation of an enslaved race seems, at first thought, a most uncertain and perilous undertaking. To do away with inherited and constantly strengthening tendencies toward irresponsibility and idleness,—to substitute the pleasure of activity or the distant good from industry for the very palpable influence of... more...

THE SILENT CHIMES. PUTTING THEM UP. I hardly know whether to write this history, or not; for its events did not occur within my own recollection, and I can only relate them at second-hand—from the Squire and others. They are curious enough; especially as regards the three parsons—one following upon another—in their connection with the Monk family, causing no end of talk in Church Leet parish, as... more...

CHARIVARIA. "The King," says The Manchester Courier, "has returned all his German Orders." So much for the taunt that Britain's object in taking part in the War was to pick up German orders. We hear that, in addition to lowering the lights at night, the authorities intend, in order to confuse the enemy, to alter the names of some of our thoroughfares, and a start is to be made with... more...

A GOOD-NATURED TEMPEST. It was stated in the Echo that, during the late storm, a brig "brought into Dover harbour two men, with their ribs and arms broken by a squall off Beachy Head. The deck-house and steering-gear were carried away, and the men taken to Dover Hospital." Who shall say, after this, that storms do not temper severity with kindness? This particular one, it is true, broke some... more...

THE PRODIGIES. We—Great-aunts Emily and Louisa—had in our innocence been telling a few old fairy stories at bedtime to those three precocities whom our hosts call their children. We knew that they talked Latin and Greek in their sleep and were too much for their parents in argument, but we thought that at least, at the story hour—— We were stopped by Drusilla. "I don't think much of... more...