" A PROTEUS IN POLITICS :-"The sweet and bitter fool In motley here!"--KING LEAR. Faith, there has been much Many wearing rapiers are afraid of goose-quills! to do on both sides, and the Nation holds it no sin to tarre them on to controversy." "We'll e'en to't like French falconers, fly at any thing we see."-HAMLET. "Franky dear!" quoth her Majesty to H. R. H. the Field-marshal, the day after Oxford's pistolpractice, "do you think we shall be safe in going out?" "Yes, mein life," was the reply, we sall go out, and the Whigs sall not!"-" Buss me, Franky!" "No gentleman (said the Times), will attend the House of Commons this evening. Every gentleman will of course be at Ascot Races." Yet a full House assembled at the usual hour. We are constrained by a very painful necessity to confirm the truth of the Times's remark. No gentleman attended the House of Commons upon that evening! Sir James Graham has taken office, under the Carlton, with Billy Holmes. The one is Tory whipperin, the other Tory whipper-out. The presentation of candlesticks to the late Lord Mayor, Wilson, was not out of place, considering how much he stands in need of enlightenment. But how much more appropriately would they have been presented to his predecessor, Cowan, being all in the way of trade. The thing would have been altogether complete had Hawes, the Lambeth chandler, and tallow - faced member of the House of Commons, presented these splendid candlesticks, mounted with his own dips, to that other chandler, Cowan. Wilson's speech, in returning thanks for the candlesticks, was cast in a perfect mould of eloquence. Here was the splendid exordium : 66 G-g-gentlemen," (quoth Sam), "f-f-f-eelings are of two kindsp-p-pain and p-p-pleasure!" Mr. Bellamy's license is about to be removed, in consequence of the disorderly scenes which he permits nightly on his premises. It was very much a-miss for the potboy to fire at the royal carriage, and hit the wall. plot of land for the site of an Infant School at Melbourne. The noble Viscount will, also, we trust, in order to complete this good work, be the founder of a Magdalen Institution. When a certain Irish Earl was "found guilty of being daft," as Uncle Wattie says, a barrister, in corroboration of his insanity, gravely informed the judge, in language worthy of his country's reputation: "My Lord, we are told that, on the Right Honourable Earl being asked how many two and two made, his Lordship replied: Latherum-dum, latherum-dee,' or words to that effect!" Such are precisely Lord Palmerston's diplomatic answers to questions put to him in the House of Commons, upon our foreign policy. ON THE YORK CANVASS. When Yorke's for York returned, then York will rue, - A project for cleansing the person of Alderman Humphrey, M.P., has been referred to the Commissioners of Sewers. that, determined to stow away her Majesty secure from the assaults of future treason, she undoes her stays, makes a hole in her flabby bosom, and bursts forth with: "Hide in my heart, thou gracious Queen!" a vengeance. - Heaven forefend that we should keep a register of all the nonsense that has been perpetrated by poetic donkeys, on the occasion of her Majesty's escape from Oxford's Here is enthusiasm on stilts with pistol practice. This was one of those grand events which is invariably signalised by an escapade of all the rhymed rigmarole that has been pent up for previous seasons in the flat bosoms of elderly poetesses, and the buttermilk brains of juvenile poetasters. One venerable petticoat is so overcome with dismay, "Shield, shield from harmFrom earth, or hell, our country's Queen!" We should hope that there is no of the Divine mercy to keep her necessity for a special interposition Majesty out of the second limb, or limbo, of the sentence ! SIR ROBERT HARRY INGLIS'S LAMENT. ADDRESSED TO THE OXFORD DIVINES. Он, dear! oh, dear! my late disgrace My party left me in the lurch, And ev'n on Church Extension ! The deuce a house could I collect, Then for to hide my grievous shame My flood of tears effaced each name, I fear, my friends, that if so be You wish more empty churches, You'll have yourselves the ground and brick I've sold the damaged documents, For bacon-distribution; They fetched exactly half-a-crown, And there's my contribution! Her Majesty has marked her sense of the respect which is due to Sir M. Wood, and his greasy aldermanic colleagues, by positively declining to dine with them at Guildhall. Her principal collateral objection was, the disgust which she conceived for Gog and Magog, in consequence of having had the misfortune to peruse the first number of Master Humphrey's Clock. "Quid putas de puero poculorum?" (What do you think of the pot-boy?) said Maidstone the other day to Sibthorp. "Elegans est homo post porcum?" (He's a nice man after a pig) was Sib.'s reply. "Cur?" (Why?) "He was a cur," quoth Sib., "and a cochleare simplex (a mere spoon), amavit nimium dimidium dimidiumque! (He was too fond of half-and-half measures !) Cur non melius jaculavit?" (Why did he not shoot better?) Traditor es, et inebriatus ad ocream!" (You're a traitor, and drunk, to boot,) said Maidstone. "Mentiris; seca baculum tuum!" (You lie; cut your stick,) was the enraged Sib's reply. "Proh Deos pisciculosque, si haberem gladium meum militarem, quem, porcis volentibus, contrà te et Oxoniensem, mox producam, currerem vos ambo per!" (By all the Gods and little fishes, if I only had my militia sword, which, please the pigs, I'll soon produce against Oxford and yourself, I'd run you both through!) cut would be sufficient to extinguish a man of ordinary sensibility. Here an Irish bogtrotter paraded his hulking person in a military coat, hired for the nonce in Holywell Street, the hinch-buttons of which gave forth a maudlin twinkle between the shoulders, while the diminutive skirts terminated somewhere about the waist. There a hero, four feet six inches in height, was enveloped from shoulder to toe in a scarlet garment, which might have served him for a double blanket. One poor wretch luxuriated in epaulettes, which, at a side view, altogether concealed his miserable head. Another sported shoulder-knots so diminutive and dingy as to look like dirty patches. And, then, the knockkneed, the flute-shanked, the bandylegged, the twist-calved, the splayfooted, the club-footed, the bunnioned, the stooped, the fiddlebacked, the no-chested, the allbellied, the awkward-armed, each affecting the port military, and all striving to look the hero! Her Majesty christened her "faithful Commons" the "dirty buffs," and Prince Albert replied with the "awkward squad." Young Dundas made himself particularly conspicuous by standing at the bar, with his rear rank towards the Speaker, while his military coat opened wide behind, and exhibited not the cleanest pair of "ducks." He was the derision, not of the House alone, but of the Reporters' Gallery, where, in reply to a youngster's question as to who Dundas was, an old hand, slightly altering the name, ejaculated with great felicity," D-d ass!" BELFAST AND BANDON LETTERS. J stands for Jackson and Jackassery; T stands for Tennent and Tracasserie! To CHEESEMONGERS AND OTHERS.-Ready for delivery, at a halfpenny per pound, forty tons of foundered literature, viz: Mrs. Trollope's Unsatisfactory Boy, Master Humphrey's Clock (refer to the se On the night of the Queen's Ball, several juvenile members went down to the House to exhibit themselves in their deputy-lieutenant's uniforms. We protest to heaven that the ridiculous figure which they cond meaning in Johnson's Dictionary: 'an unsightly, crawling thing!") Captain Marryat's "Alas, Poor Jack!" and Turpis Ainsworth's Guy Fox:" An animal cunning, unsavoury, small, Messrs. Anderton and King, the busy-bodies of the Common Council, closely resemble those fetid animals, a jackall and a kangaroo ! The Maria Wood, in which the Corporation of London performs its summer excursion, led to an amus ing scene some time since in the Common Council. It was certainly too bad to find so notorious a gastronome as Guzzling Galloway (for so he has been called), objecting to the expenses of a corporate feed. We shall next have Satan reproving sin, and the pot blackguarding the kettle for its blackness. The indignation with which he spoke of feasting on this occasion, was only exceeded by the avidity which he had previously manifested in devouring all that came before him. Deputy Angel was very amusing, though unquestionably somewhat ridiculous. His alliteration was pleasant enough:-"Shall the wives and widows of the Corporation be deprived of one short day's enjoyment! Forbid it gratitude, forbid it generosity, forbid it genius, forbid it Galloway!" It is a pity that old Angel should be so deaf as not to be able to hear the effects of his own jokes. Alderman Tom Wood made a capital Ude speech. "Our municipal institutions (he had the audacity to say) are best supported by elegant entertainments, such as the motion aims at putting an end to." The division that followed this discussion (which was all in favour of the discussion of such pleasant topics as turtle and venison), was very characteristic. The numbers were Majority of belly-gods Tyas has just published a capital sketch, by Leech, of "The Regicide Pot-boy," a marvellous likeness of Oxford à la jeune France. The knot of his cravat has wandered towards his ear, and combines with a gallows-looking lamp-post to form a very pretty moral. The psychological sketch underneath of the pot-boy, composed of pipes and pewter, is in Leech's usual free and flowing style. No lover of genuine wit should be without this capital sketch. -The Gresham Committee have immortalised themselves by their rascality in the Tite job. Every architect in London laughs at Tite's plan for the rebuilding of the Royal Exchange, in which the columns in the grand portico (which is to eclipse St. Martin's in the Fields!) are absolutely pitchforked together without the slightest reference to the rules of intercolumniation. The competence of Tite's majority on the Gresham Committee, to decide this question, may be inferred from the fact, that that majority is constituted of one bricklayer, two painters and glaziers, two pettifogging attornies, a printer, and a coal-retailer-alias, knight of the black diamond. Shades of Christopher Wren and Inigo Jones, how do ye feel? We will be sworn, not comfortable. - We pray the valets and pot - Oxford is worshipped by the penny-a-liners. We take it that he is one of the craft. At all events, his "report" has made more noise than any that has been issued for many a long day. What an inte resting "case" for the fraternity was the potboy's case of pistols! Pray, Mr. Jones, Chairman of the London Bridge Committee, surveyor, valuator, referee, and every thing else you can get that will bring grist to the mill, how much did you get from Tite, who is joint-surveyor with you to the Blackwall Railway, for your advocacy of his architectural pretensions before the Gresham Committee? There's something rotten in the Common Council ! -"Beastly bellowing," is strictly parliamentary; but to call it by its right name, is a horse of another colour. It is a cruel beast, like most monkeys, for it slays numberless kids to garnish its paws withal, in monkey imitativeness of the habits of gentlemen. Some aver that it has been once to the opera, and dresses after Coletti. It has a disagreeable trick of rapping its baton against the music-desk, for which, like an ill-mannered monkey as it is, it should be seized by the back of the neck and consigned to the belly of the "doublebass." Potage à la Julienne means "spring soup." These concerts, therefore, instead of being clumsily called "Concerts d'Eté," might be prettily christened after the conductor, "Concerts à la Julienne," or "Spring Concerts," which, seeing that they were projected in Ape-ril, would suit the monkey to a hair. It weareth a maudlin look of inspiration, and deeming itself a genius, hath absolutely composed a "grand Triumphal March, dedicated to the Queen of England!!"-a wonderful effort for a monkey, in which gongs, discords, and all manner of con fuoco clap-traps conspire to deafen Victoria's dutiful subjects. Her Majesty, dreading the effect upon their hearing, has determined to remove Jacko Julien from its present post, and make it her permanent Cornet Piston. It is a self-sufficient, though diminutive animal; and, conducting once in Paris, when a gentleman |