like any other woman; now, it's impossible; and it's cruelyes, Mr. Caudle, cruel-of you to expect it.

"Apples ar'n't so dear, are they? I know what apples are, Mr. Caudle, without your telling me. But I suppose you want something more than apples for dumplings? I suppose sugar costs something, doesn't it? And that's how it is. That's how one expense brings on another, and that's how people go to ruin.

"Pancakes? What's the use of your lying muttering there about pancakes? Don't you always have 'em once a year— every Shrove Tuesday? And what would any moderate, decent man want more?

"Pancakes, indeed! Pray, Mr. Caudle-no, it's no use your saying fine words to me to let you go to sleep; I sha'n't Pray, do you know the price of eggs just now? There's not an egg you can trust to under seven and eight a shilling; well, you've only just to reckon up how many eggs-don't lie swearing there at the eggs in that manner, Mr. Caudle; unless you expect the bed to let you fall through. You call yourself a respectable tradesman, I suppose? Ha! I only wish people knew you as well as I do! Swearing at eggs, indeed! But I'm tired of this usage, Mr. Caudle; quite tired of it; and I don't care how soon it's ended!

66

'I'm sure I do nothing but work and labour, and think how to make the most of everything; and this is how I'm rewarded."—" Mrs. Caudle's Curtain Lectures."

Bits of Repartee

THE first time Jerrold saw Tom Dibdin, the song-writer said to him, "Youngster, have you sufficient confidence in me to lend me a guinea?" "Oh, yes," said Jerrold, "I've all the confidence, but I haven't the guinea."

Jerrold went to a party at which a Mr. Pepper had assembled all his friends. Jerrold said to his host, on entering the room, "My dear Mr. Pepper, how glad you must be to see all your friends mustered!”

Upon another occasion he and Laman Blanchard were strolling together about London, discussing passionately a plan for joining Byron in Greece. The former, telling the story many years after, said, "But a shower of rain came on and washed all the Greece out of us."

"Do you know," said a friend to him, "that Jones has left the stage and turned wine merchant?" "Oh, yes," Jerrold replied, "and I'm told that his wine off the stage is better than his whine on it."

A friend seeking subscriptions for a person in trouble asked Jerrold for his mite. "What will put him right?" said Jerrold. "Oh! a one and two naughts," said the other. "Put me down for one of the naughts," said Jerrold.

He was once finding fault with a play. An acquaintance expostulated, and said, "Why, there's V-; he was bred

on these boards!" "He looks," said Jerrold, "as though he'd been cut out of them."

"Call that a kind man?" said an actor, speaking of an absent acquaintance. "A man who is away from his family, and never sends them a farthing? Call that kindness?" "Yes, unremitting kindness," was the reply.

One sunny morning a quidnunc and a bore was sauntering down Regent Street, seeking whom he might devour with his interminable twaddle. At length he espies, approaching in hot haste, the no less busy Douglas Jerrold. He stops and fastens on him. The bore puts his usual question, “Well, my dear Jerrold, what's going on?" Releasing himself, the wit strides hastily away, exclaiming, "I am."

Heraud, the writer, was another bore who inflicted "all his tediousness on Jerrold. The satirist was asked if he had read Heraud's "Descent into Hell"? "No," was the answer, "but I should like to see it."

Jerrold was seriously disappointed with a certain book written by one of his friends. This friend heard that he had expressed his disappointment. Friend (to Jerrold): "I heard you said it was the worst book I ever wrote." Jerrold: "No, I didn't. I said it was the worst book anybody ever wrote."

Some one was talking with him about a gentleman as celebrated for the intensity as for the shortness of his friendships. "Yes," said Jerrold, "his friendships are so warm, that he no sooner takes them up than he puts them down again."

Jerrold met Alfred Bunn one day in Piccadilly. Bunn stopped Jerrold, and said, "I suppose you're strolling about, picking up character." "Well, not exactly," said Jerrold, "but there's plenty lost hereabouts."

One day enjoying a drive with a well-known spendthrift"Well, Jerrold," said the friend, who was driving a very fine pair of grays, "what do you think of my grays?" "To tell you the truth," Jerrold replied, “I was just thinking of your duns."

A mediocre writer, employed on the same subject as himself, said, “You know, Jerrold, you and I are rowing in the same boat!" "Yes," replied the wit, "but not with the same oars!"

Abolishing the "Cat"

Nutts. Now, Mr. Slowgoe, when you've gone through the alphabet of that paper, I'm ready.

Slowgoe. Just one minute.

Nutts. Minutes, Mr. Slowgoe, are the small-change of life. Can't wait for nobody. I'll take you then, Mr. Limpy. (LIMPY takes the chair.) It makes my flesh crawl to see some folks with a newspaper. They go through it for all the world like a caterpillar through a cabbage-leaf.

Slowgoe. Well, for my part, I like to chew my news. I think a newspaper's like a dinner; doesn't do you half the good if it's bolted. Haven't come to it yet; but tell me— Is it true that the Duke of Wellington's going to repeal flogging?"

Tickle. Why, yes; they do say so; but the duke does nothin' in a hurry. Always likes to take his time. You know at Waterloo he would wait for the Prussians; and only because if he'd licked the French afore, he didn't know how else to spend the evening.

Slowgoe. I never heard that; but it's very like the duke. And there's to be no flogging.

Tickle. No; it's to be repealed by degrees, like the cornlaws. In nine years' time there won't be a single cat in the British army.

Nosebag. Why should they wait nine years?

Nutts. Nothin' but reg'lar. You see the cat-o'-nine-tails is one of the institutions of the country, and therefore must be handled very delicate.

"When cat's away
Sojers play."

That's been the old notion. And folks-that is, the folks with gold lace that's never flogged-think to 'bolish the cat at once would bring a blight upon laurels. They think sojers like eels-none the worse for fire for being well skinned.

Tickle. There you are; biting the 'thorities of your country agin. But since you've taken the story out of my mouth, go on, though every word you speak's a bitter almond.

Nutts. Well, it isn't a thing to talk sugar-plums about, is it? I'm not a young lady, am I?

Mrs. Nutts (from back parlour). I wish you'd remember you've a wife and children, Mr. Nutts, and never mind young ladies. You can't shave and talk of young ladies, too, I'm sure.

Nutts (in a low voice). It's very odd; she's one of the