Games/Humor Books

THE MYSTERY OF MR. E. DROOD: AN ADAPTATION. BY ORPHEUS C. KERR. CHAPTER XVI. AVUNCULAR DEVOTIO Having literally fallen asleep from his chair to the rug, J. BUMSTEAD, Esquire, was found to have reached such an extraordinary depth in slumber, that Mr. and Mrs. SMYTHE, his landlord and landlady, who were promptly called in by Mr. DIBBLE, had at first some fear that they should never be able to drag him... more...

No. IX.—THE DUFFER DEER-STALKING. I am in favour of Mr. BRYCE's Access to Mountains Bill, and of Crofters who may be ambitious to cultivate the fertile slopes of all the Bens in Scotland. In fact, I am in favour of anything that will, or may, interfere with the tedious toil of Deer-stalking. Mr. BRYCE's Bill, I am afraid, will do no good. People want Access to Mountains when they cannot get... more...

THE LAST WOMAN. (A contemporary Pendant to "The Last Man.") [It is stated that the dreaded Crinoline has actually made its appearance in one or two quarters.] All modish shapes must melt in gloom, Great Worth himself must die, Before the Sex again assume Eve's sweet simplicity! I saw a vision in my sleep, Which made me bow my head and weep As one aghast, accurst! Was it a spook before me... more...

THE MUD LARKS. THE French are a great people; the more I see of them the more I admire them, and I have been seeing a lot of them lately. I seem to have spent the last week eating six-course dinners in cellars with grizzled sky-blue colonels, endeavouring to reply to their charming compliments in a mixture of Gaelic and CORNELIUS NEPOS. I myself had no intention of babbling these jargons; it is the... more...

A MANUAL OF DENOUEMENTS. “In the king’s name, Let fall your swords and daggers.”—CRITIC. A melo-drama is a theatrical dose in two or three acts, according to the strength of the constitution of the audience. Its component parts are a villain, a lover, a heroine, a comic character, and an executioner. These having simmered and macerated through all manner of events, are strained off together... more...

THE MINERS' OPERA. About a week ago, when they took Titterby away to the large red-brick establishment which he now adorns, certain papers which were left lying in his study passed into my hands, for I was almost his only friend. It had long been Titterby's belief that a great future lay before the librettist who should produce topical light operas on the Gilbert and Sullivan model, dealing... more...

BALKS IN A BRUSH. FLORA, having no relations in the world that she knew of, had, ever since her seventh new bonnet, known no other home than Macassar Female College, in the Alms-House, and regarded Miss CAROWTHERS as her mother-in-lore. Her memory of her own mother was of a lady-like person who had swiftly waisted away in the effort to be always taken for her own daughter, and was, one day, brought... more...

ROBERT'S AMERICAN ACQUAINTANCE. My akwaintance among eminent selebraties seems to be rapidly encreasing. Within what Amlet calls a week, a little week, after my larst intervue with the emenent young Swell as amost lost his art to the pretty Bridesmade, I have been onored with the most cordial notice of a werry emenent Amerrycane, who cums to Lundon wunce ewery year, and makes a good long stay, and... more...

THE PLAYS AND SHOWS. BATHOS and pathos are closely allied in sound as well as in sense. Mr. FECHTER evidently regards them as completely identical; and in his acting, as in his pronunciation, uniformly prefers the former to the latter. He has recently exemplified this by his personation of CLAUDE MELNOTTE, in that most tawdry specimen of the cotton-velvet drama, the LADY OF LYONS. This melancholy event... more...

June 23, 1920 Kieff has been retaken by the Bolshevists. It looks as if the Poles will have to win the place three times in succession before it becomes their own property. Annoyed by a small boy who was sucking sweets and laughing a parson recently stopped in the middle of his sermon and refused to go on with it. We are informed that the boy in question has since received several tempting offers from... more...