SPORTIVE SONGS.

A Betrothed Individual of the Weaker Sex is surprised by intelligence from San Francisco.

A LITTLE line of love you send
Across the "herring-pond" to me,
Who was and is and will be friend
So long as friend I yet may be;
So long as in the far, far West,

You don't forget your plighted troth,
And do remember that the best

Of all this life is near for both. There was a time, I think, my own, When separation seemed an ill Scarce to be borne by one alone,Who had Love's message to fulfil. And yet you crossed that wretched sea, On Californian coast to roam, Impelled, you said, while you were free, To look upon Great Freedom's Home! You write with something of reproof About Miss ANGELINA BROWNFrom her I've strictly held aloof

Since you, my love, went out of town. A pelican could not be more

Ôn desert sand regenerate,

And yet your tone is very sore

When writing from the Golden Gate.

A cablegram! The horrid thing

Has sent a quirer through my brain! That hardened knock! That brazen ring! Are prophets of a coming pain! "Married to-day" the message reads,

Not naming the presumptuous clown. From you my heart (don't think it bleeds) Is turning-yearning for Miss Brown!

THE BIKER BIKED.

HENPEOK'D he was. He learnt to bike.
"Now I can go just where I like,"
He chuckled to himself. But she
Had learnt to bike as well as he,

And, what was more. had bought a new
Machine to sweetly carry two.
Ever together now they go,

He sighing, "This is wheel and woe."

AN UNCIVIL WAR.

["On account of the strike of engineers in England, the Japanese Government has placed its order for a new armoured cruiser, representing about half a million sterling, in the hands of the French."Daily Paper.]

YE demagogues of England,

That draw your Union's fees,
And smile to watch our foreign trade
Drift out across the seas!

Belated lie our hollow ships,
The sport of jealous foes,

While you bluff loud enough

And the stormy language flows,

While you bravely egg your clients on
And the stormy language flows.

They are Britannia's bulwarks,

Her towers along the deep,

With them it rests that name and fame
Shall still be hers to keep!

Care you at all down what descent
Your country's credit goes,
While they shirk England's work
And the mob-oration flows,
Hoist upon their own petards
While the mob-oration flows?

Ye Chroniclers of England,

Our workmen's boasted friends, Who fly the agitator's flag

For certain private ends! Good must it be to feel how fast Your circulation grows, While your hacks bend their backs And the ink serenely flows, While they play the game of life and death And the easy liquid flows. Capitalists of England!

How long shall these things be?
How long shall labour idly stand

Barred out with lock and key?
Noblesse oblige! Your nation's hopes
Are in the deadly throes!
Find a way how best to pay

The debt that honour owes!
They win the most that pay the debt
A patriot's honour owes.

THE BOOM IN OOM.

Though swollen big from being small,
No airs does he assume;

He keeps the state of honest PAUL
Whose other name is OоM;

No proud tiara decks his poll,

He wears a common topper,
Having the economic soul
Ideal in a Dopper.

His only meal is mutton-broth,
He never tasted sack;

A coat of broad and sable cloth

Hangs down his modest back;

And though he paints his nether guise With just a touch of tartan,

His tout ensemble justifies

The epithet of Spartan.

He sits at home with pensive brows,
Taxing his teeming brain

To answer wires about his spouse
From Mr. CHAMBERLAIN;

And when at times the stress of things

Would tend to make him falter,

He clears his fluty throat and sings

A segment from the Psalter.

No courtly plumage puts he on,
Still humbly he behaves,
When sallying out to sit upon
His Raad of burgher braves;
Proceeding in a simple fly

Or Government four-wheeler,
He goes his way escorted by
A single mounted peeler.

II. "AND ON THIS."

So sang I once, so told the charm
Of Оom's alluring grace;

But now I notice with alarm

A change has taken place;
Within the lute begins to show
A rift of rude dimensions!
And feet of clay appear below

My idol's stern extensions!
For, see! the fallen one has bought
From Britain, over seas,
A Jubilee conveyance, wrought
With regal blazonries!
There flash the arms of early Boers
With fine heraldic feeling,
And eagles swarm about the doors
And also on the ceiling.

Some enemy has worked, I wis,
Upon his guileless age,
And pricked him on to order this
Insidious equipage;

For now that, where the end is thin,
The wedge is once inserted,
His feet along the path of sin
Are hopelessly diverted.

Where will he stop? Far down the years
I see his tastes decline

On jewels bartered from De Beers,

Or some adjacent mine;

With costly liquors, long and warm,
I see his bosom flutter

Beneath a fetching uniform

Shaped by a German cutter!

How wanton pride may lead to shame Was shown in ancient time,

A CUT BENEATH HER.

Lady of the House. "OH, YES, JANE, I ASKED MRS. JOHNSTON TO LET HER LITTLE BOY AND HIS NURSE CALL TO GO WALKING WITH YOU AND THE CHILDREN."

Nurse. "WELL, MA'AM, I HOPE AS YOU DON'T EXPECT ME TO GO WALKING WITH THAT YOUNG PERSON? I DON'T THINK YOU CAN BE AWARE AS SHE IS ONLY A NURSE-'OUSEMAID!"

When HANNIBAL (who likewise came
From Afric's sultry clime)
At Capua, that giddy spot,
Indulged in hibernation,
Till all his gallant army got
Quite ill with enervation!

O, Little England, dear to OOM!
I ask you, was it fair

To see him sent to certain doom

Through such a deadly snare?
And O, my LABBY! have you then
Sullied your latest laurels
By looking on while wicked men
Debauched a brother's morals?

of everybody, that the friction would be only temporary. ("Hear! Hear!")

Sir BLUNDELL MAPLE said: I wish well to all these hotel schemes, which, I am maple to say ("Oh! Oh!"), are doing uncommonly well. ("Bravo!")

Mr. HOLLAND observed that he and his brother, though a pair, were not to be considered as "Double Dutchmen." ("No! No!") He thought Mr. GORDON'S quotation from La Grande Dutch-esse rather personal; but, for his part, and complimenting the Chairman of the Gordon Hotelanders on his vocal chords ("Hear! Hear!") he hoped sincerely that soon they would all be in the same key, act in unison, and that their voices henceforth would be in harmony. (Enthusiastic applause.)

There was a show of hands, when everybody shook everybody else's hand in the cheeriest possible manner.

THE GORDON HOTELANDERS. (Summary of Meeting at the Métropole) MR. FREDERICK GORDON said he was "gored on" ("Oh! Oh!") by his partners, and so he acted agordonly. ("Oh! Oh! [We have since ascertained, too late, however, Oh!") Up to now he had always con- to prevent this from going to press, that the above sidered Sauce Hollandaise (cheers) an ex-report is an entire invention; but as it was evidently cellent thing. ("Hear!") But it might conceived in a friendly spirit, it is to be hoped that be made just a little too sharp. He had the real result will be as satisfactory as our False read what had been said about him in the Reporter has imagined it.—ED.] Holland manifesto, and he might, if they would allow him, sing from La Grande Duchesse:

"Voilà ce que l'on dit de moi

Dans la Gazette de Hollande! Oui!" (laughter), but he hoped, in the interests

At the Colchester Oyster Feast. Polite Stranger (to Neighbouring Native). May I pass you the Chili vinegar? Neighbouring Native. No, thank you. I always prefer my oysters neat.