Chapter C: G. LELAND, Breitmann Ballads

There is nothing more universally commended
than a fine day; the reason is, that people can
commend it without envy.

SHENSTONE, _Essays_.

Let the singing singers,
With vocal voices, most vociferous,
In sweet vociferation out-vociferize
Even sound itself.

_Chrononhotonthologos_, in CAREY's farce.

Giving advice is, many times, only the privilege
of saying a foolish thing one's self, under pretence
of hindering another from doing one.

POPE, _Thoughts on Various Subjects_.

Of pay or play may preach this knot--
Of death or duns or love's devotion--
I tied it yesterday, but what
It means, I've not the faintest notion.

H. CHOLMONDELEY PENNELL, _Pegasus Resaddled_.

_René._ Qu'est ce que c'est donc que les affaires,
Monsieur Giraud?
_Giraud._ Les affaires? c'est bien simple; c'est
l'argent des autres.

DUMAS fils, _La Question d'Argent_.

Tous les méchants sont buveurs d'eau.

COMTE DE SÉGUR.

Miss Pellingle commences "Rousseau's
Dream," with variations. Beautiful melody, by
itself first, clear and distinct.

Now the air tries to break out between alternate notes,
like a prisoner behind bars. Then we have a variation
entirely bass.

_Happy thought._--Rousseau snoring.

Then a scampering up, a meeting with the right
hand, a scampering down, and a leap off one note into
space. Then both in the middle, wobbling; then down
into the bass again.

_Happy thought._--Rousseau after a heavy supper.

A plaintive variation.--Rousseau in pain.

Light strain: Mazurka time.--Rousseau kicking in his
sleep.

F. C. BURNAND, _Happy Thoughts_.

Sad is that woman's lot who, year by year,
Sees, one by one, her beauties disappear,
When Time, grown weary of her heart-drawn sighs,
Impatiently begins to "dim her eyes!"
Compelled at last, in life's uncertain gloamings,
To wreathe her wrinkled brow with well-saved "combings,"
Reduced with rouge, lip-salve, and pearly gray,
To "make up" for lost time, as best she may!

_Lady Jane_, in W. S. GILBERT's _Patience_.

No coinage in circulation so fluctuates in value as
the worth of a marriageable man.

LORD LYTTON, _What will he do with it?_

_ANATHEMA IN EXCELSIS._

Creed of St. Anathasius? No, indeed.
Call it, good priests, the Anathemasian Creed.

SHIRLEY BROOKS, _Wit and Humour_.

Mistrust all those who love you extremely upon
a very slight acquaintance, and without any
visible reason.

LORD CHESTERFIELD, _Maxims_.

_BENEVOLENT NEUTRALITY._

When man and wife at odds fall out,
Let Syntax be your tutor;
'Twixt masculine and feminine,
What should one be but neuter?

ANON.

MY friend the late Sam Phillips one day met Douglas
Jerrold, and told him he had seen, the day before,
Payne Collier looking wonderfully gay and
well--quite an evergreen. "Ah," said Jerrold, "he may
be evergreen, but he's never _read_." On my repeating
this to Hicks, he smiled and said, "Now that's what I
call 'ready wit.'"

J. C. YOUNG, _Diary_.

One day, when conversing with [a] friend, something
was said on the subject of religious persecution,
on which [Whately] remarked, "It is no wonder
that some English people have a taste for persecuting on
account of religion, since it is the first lesson that most
are taught in their nurseries." His friend expressed his
incredulity, and denied that _he_, at least, had been taught
it. "Are you sure?" replied Dr. Whately. "What
think you of this--
'Old Daddy Longlegs _won't say his prayers_,
Take him by the left leg, and throw him downstairs'?

If that is not religious persecution, what is?"

E. J. WHATELY, _Life of Whately_.

_ON A PUBLIC-HOUSE._

Of this establishment how can we speak?
Its cheese is mity, and its ale is weak.

ANON.

At a fête at Hatfield House, _tableaux vivants_ were
among the chief amusements, and scenes from
_Ivanhoe_ were among the selections. All the
parts were filled up but that of _Isaac of York_. Lady
Salisbury begged Lord Alvanley "to make the set complete,
by doing the Jew." "Anything in my power your
ladyship may demand," replied Alvanley; "but though
no man in England has tried oftener, I never could _do a
Jew_ in my life."

R. H. BARHAM, _Life_.

There's nothing we read of in torture's inventions,
Like a well-meaning dunce with the best of intentions.

J. R. LOWELL, _A Fable for Critics_.

_THE POPE._

Miss D., on her return to the Highlands of Scotland,
from Rome, went to see an auld Scottish
wife, and said, to interest the old woman, "I
have been to Rome since I saw you--I have seen all
sorts of great people--I have seen the Pope." The sympathetic
old dame replied with animation, "The Pope of
Rome!--Honest marn!--haze he ony family?"

FREDERICK LOCKER, _Patchwork_.

Nay, tempt me not, Arab, again to stay;
Since I crave neither _Echo_ nor _Fun_ to-day,
For thy _hand_ is not Echoless--there they are,
_Fun_, _Glowworm_, and _Echo_, and _Evening Star_:
And thou hintest withal that thou fain wouldst shine,
As I con them, these bulgy old boots of mine.
But I shrink from thee, Arab! Thou eat'st eel-pie,
Thou evermore hast at least one black eye;
There is brass on thy brow, and thy swarthy hues
Are due not to nature but handling shoes;
And the bit in thy mouth, I regret to see,
Is a bit of tobacco-pipe--Flee, child, flee!