Part 2

_Mopsa_ (_shocked_). ALFRED! How _can_ you? What _have_ I said or done to encourage such a proposal? So utterly unexpected!

_Alfred_ (_feebly_). I really couldn't help it. It's the troll inside me. What am I saying? That belongs to another Norwegian drama!

_Mopsa._ All this part belongs to _several_ other Norwegian dramas, dear. But we must see if we can't get out of the old groove _this_ time!

_Alfred._ But why in the world----? When you showed such a wonderful preference for my society, too!

_Mopsa_ (_gently_). I know, dear. But that was before----. Let me tell you something. (_Slow music;_ ALFRED _sits down, cautiously_.) I've just been looking through my big portfolio, and I've discovered--what _do_ you think? (ALFRED _shakes his head hopelessly_.) I'm not KAIA'S daughter at all, really. I'm only adopted!

_Alfred._ But what difference does that make in _our_ relations? Practically, none whatever!

_Mopsa._ _All_ the difference, ALFRED. I always pursued you about with reluctance and under protest. Being, as I supposed, descended from KAIA FOSLI, and related to REBECCA WEST, it seemed so utterly the right thing to do. But I know _now_ that I am nothing of the sort, and that if my real mother ever possessed such a thing as a Past at all, it was Plu-perfect. So heredity doesn't come in, and, rather than interfere between you and poor dear SPRETA, I have decided to go right away and never see you again. I really _mean_ it, _this_ time!

[_She opens her umbrella and runs off up the slope._

_Alfred_ (_takes up his hat sadly_). Isn't this play going to end pessimistically after all, then? (_Shudders._) Are we actually going to be--moral? (_More hopefully._) After all, there's another Act left. There's a chance still!

[_He follows hastily after_ MOPSA.

* * * * *

MOTTO FOR THE PRESIDENT OF THE FRENCH REPUBLIC.--"Faure-warned, Faure-armed."

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* * * * *

RETRIBUTION.

(_Wrought by a cheap Foreign Cigar._)

I'm feeling--great heavens!--all sixes and sevens, And dizzy, and giddy, and green; Knocked flat as a pancake, I've got a blank, blank ache All over--a sight to be seen!

Alas! for the reason 'tis easy to seize on-- The same I'll proceed to relate:-- I've just come from Brussels, whence, after some tussles With conscience, I rushed to my fate.

For by Calais and Dover I safely brought over A contraband hatful of weeds; Ah, why did I struggle to juggle and smuggle, Thus paying the price for my deeds?

They cost each five farthings, and goodness! they _are_ things You'd not get your worst foe to smoke, This "Cabbagio Fino" _has_ giv'n me a beano-- But there! I'm too seedy to joke!

So this crude composition I pen in contrition, My state of collapse to explain; I thought to be clever, but never, oh never, Will make such a bargain again!

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CONTRADICTION.--A fortnight ago, in the law reports of the _Times_, were reported proceedings in bankruptcy "_in re_ TOBY." We have been requested to state that this gentleman is not _Mr. Punch's_ "TOBY, M.P.," nor is "our Mr. TOBY" the gentleman mentioned in the same case as "the bankrupt's brother, M. P. TOBY." The coincidence was, naturally, somewhat startling. Our M.P. for Barks will, by now, have appeared in his place at St. Stephen's.

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"PITY THE POOR ARTIST!"

["I have had occasion to speak on the difficulties of a minister who finds himself pledged to a very large and extensive programme, to each point of which programme there is a large circle of adherents who consider it the foremost and the preeminently important point."--_Lord Rosebery._]

_Westminster Pavement Artist loquitur:_--

Who would be a political "screever"? A drudge Foredoomed to designing, and destined to smudge, Like impressionist painters of posters? Art's in a rum way. Lor! what humbug it is! Far better the days of old CRUIKSHANK and PHIZ, Than our era of blobbers and boasters.

With chalks, and my thumb, and a bit of old rag, I can do better work on a rough slab of flag Than they do on smooth hot-pressed paper. But oh! what a bother to squat and to smear All sorts of strange subjects, quaint, squiffy and queer, To please every lounger and gaper.

There once was a time when the old repertore The public would fetch. Now they want a lot more, And always a somethink that's novel, And then such a choice of 'em! Not one or two Seascapes, with a liberal yaller and blue, Or some picture of cottage or hovel.

Two mackerels crossed, or a slice o' red salmon, A rasher o' bacon, or lump o' brown "gammon," A ginger-beer bottle and candle. A rat in a trap and a portrait or two, Say old GARIBALDI, the Wandering Jew, And p'raps JULIUS CÆSAR or HANDEL.

These gave satisfaction to parties all round; But 'tisn't so now as I lately have found. They ask a whole National Gallery. And every one wants his own fav'rite fust off. Good old "Moonlight Scene"? Why, a yokel would scoff At anythink bluey-and-yallery.

They claim fancy-chalks now, or pollychrome pastel; It's no use to tip 'em a storm or a castle; They want "local colour"--a lot of it. Yes, something distinctly Welsh, Irish, or Scotch; My pitch in these critical days is no cotch; I'm sick of the worry and rot of it!

Pity the artist! What boots that appeal? No! "Many help one," or "A heart that can feel," Won't fetch 'em, however well flourished. I _did_ think that Guy Fawkes blow-up of the Lords Would call out the coppers; but shrugs and cold words Have damped the last hope that I nourished.

Awful cynicle lot! Scarcely one a believer In _me_, it would seem, since that there Grand Old Screever To my hands has turned his pitch over. There! I've touched up the lightning, and now I am ready! But, though I must look bright, expectant, and steady, I don't feel percisely in clover!

[_Left waiting for patronage._

* * * * *

THE DECADENT LOVER OF FICTION.

"One love, one life," was my ancient manner, For introspection I had no brain, But I would have died beneath her banner, Or I would have lived, her grace to gain. I loved her silent, I loved her sprightly, With Grecian braid or with glossy curl; I loved her wrongly, I loved her rightly, But ever I loved a single girl.

But now with _ennui_ my love is laden Before it really has quite begun; If I win the heart of any maiden It makes me prefer another one. Dim passions stir me, deflections fleeting; I feel myself in a hopeless whirl. There never are less than six competing. Why can I not love a single girl?

Contented I and my love were mated In those brave days when we both were young. For marriage I'm now too complicated, Too many-natured, too finely-strung. My spreading canvas all zephyrs vary For one calm funnel how can I furl? In truth, the statute is somewhat chary. And old, and grey, grows the dearest girl!

Oh, love that was loyal, losing, winning, That time and change had no power to quell, That once could even dispense with sinning, And that possession could not dispel! Your day is done, and your star's declining, The hero was but a brainless churl Who ever dreamed that without repining His whole life long he could love _one_ girl!

And yet, I feel there is something wanting. The knowledge that love is sure to die To every lover is disenchanting. I would I loved as in days gone by. 'Twas braver folly the height to capture, Though down from the height Fate often hurls. He misses woe, but he misses rapture, Who falls in love with too many girls!

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SITTING OUT.

In throbbing silence my glances stray O'er her unreciprocal face, And I haven't a notion what to say Now I've finished with commonplace.

How I hate the slope of that cheerless chin, And the stare of those vacant eyes, That take the commonest objects in With placid and cool surprise.

And I sit in a calm that she will not break, A desert that is not peace, And ever and ever the windows shake To a dance that will never cease.

I cannot join the rout again, I am far too weary and warm. So I needs must suffer this speechless pain, In a draught, on the red baize form.

There is one remark--it has proved a key Already to one long chat, Of course--I'll start it, for even she Must answer awhile to that.

But horror! my agonised fingers curl, Did I say it to her? I think It must have been to that other girl In the delicate shrimp-sauce pink.

Shall I chance it again! I must! I will! With a stammer I've half begun-- Saved! saved! the music at last is still. Thank goodness, the dance is done.

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A WINTER WEDDING.

When bleak, bluff, blatant blizzards blew, And hats from storm-tossed heads were carried, My enterprising friend, then you Got married!

Soon spring had come, when doves can coo, And flowers blossom, had you tarried; Instead, in January you Got married.

Then in your honeymoon you two The gloom and snow of winter parried; It's two to one two won when you Were married.

And thus henceforward may you do; By life's rough storms be never harried, Together face them all now you Are married.

* * * * *

More Anglomania!

[M. FÉLIX FAURE, having gone out into the garden at about six o'clock in the evening, was making for the door leading to his private apartments, when he was stopped by a sentinel. The President could not give the pass-word, and was accordingly marched off to the Elysée guard-room, where he was fortunately recognised.--_Daily Paper._]

That Gallic statesmen rather like Trade Union methods can we doubt? President PERIER went "on strike"; Now, FAURE has been "locked out."

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DEUX MOTS.--The retirement of one of the oldest and most popular actors of the Comédie Française may be summed up in two words, "GOT: gone."

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"ART IS LONG----"

The _Daily Graphic_ of February 1, commenting on the time-contest between two pianists, suggests that exponents of the other fine arts should follow their example. The idea has been taken up at the Royal Aquarium with great success, as will be seen from the following press-cuttings:--

_From the "Magazine of Art."_

The Directors of the Aquarium are to be congratulated on their new departure, which takes the form of a highly exciting and sportsmanlike contest between those two well-known entertainers Professor HERR KOMER and Señor HARDLI DUDDI in their great poster-painting exhibition. This consists of a trial of strength and endurance, the challenger, Señor DUDDI, having given out that he will beat Professor KOMER'S previous record in time and area combined by one hour and a hundred square yards. As the public are well aware, the latter performer's sensational achievement, "_Miss Letty Lind_," stands at present unbeaten as an artistic poster, having far eclipsed his "_All Beautiful in Naked Purity_," which attracted such attention on the Royal Academy hoardings last year. As to time, his LIND _tour de force_ (shown at the Society of Portrait Painters at the New Gallery last autumn) was painted in one continuous whirl or sitting of fifty hours duration, and would have taken even longer, had not the accomplished _danseuse_ fainted from exhaustion. (It is understood, by the way, that Miss LIND has issued a challenge that she will pirouette against the world, including Lord YARMOUTH and Little TICH.)

Señor DUDDI has hitherto made his mark with presentments of ultra-_chic_ young ladies, which have certainly taken up a great deal of space, and fulfilled their purpose as "eye-openers." We have no details as to the time in which they were designed, but we should think about twenty minutes on an average.

As the Aquarium contest will not be concluded until after we go to press, we cannot give the result, but at the time of writing, after three days' painting without cessation, Mr. KOMER had covered a quarter of an acre of canvas, while Mr. DUDDI had traversed three hundred yards of advertisement hoarding. Both were going well and strong, the only people showing signs of exhaustion being the umpires and spectators.

_From the "Sporting Times."_

What will our dear friends of the Anti-Sporting League say to this? Here's yet another form of iniquity, the Poet Stakes at the Aquarium! We looked in last night at that classic abode, and found them all hard at it in the Bijou Theatre. We soon made a pretty book, and only regret we hadn't entered BALLYHOOLY and DOSS CHIDERDOSS. A black-haired colt was making the pace with what he called "beautiful prose music," quite as good as any we turn out in our first page. But the backers rather fancied a Chestnut Pegasus, who was going well within his stride with his "Odes and Poems." There were one or two other dark horses in the field, that we put down for a place. That worthy and veteran sportsman, and cutest of tipsters, G. ALLEN, wielded the flag, and got his little lot off, as we were told, with only ten false starts. We left at the fifty-seventh hour, when the leaders had completed two hundred and twenty laps of very blank verse and other paces, it being a go-as-you-please contest. A sonnet divided the first and second, and there was an epigram and a half between the second and the third. As it promised to be a long-winded affair, and rather too noisy for our refined and delicate constitutions, we retired early. We give the odds, however, on another page.

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* * * * *

ESSENCE OF PARLIAMENT.

EXTRACTED FROM THE DIARY OF TOBY, M.P.

_Tuesday, February 5._--House filled once more with bustle of new Session. Lobby crowded. Corridors, long silent, burst into bustling life. "Seems to me," says JEMMY LOWTHER, looking on with his juvenile-veteran air, "that the happiest day in a member's life is the first of a Session, if indeed the cup of his joy isn't fuller on the day of prorogation."

For some the jubilation of the hour is toned down by saddened thought. There is one step that will never more be heard in the lobby, one familiar face seen here no more, one voice, wont to sway the passions of the House, that now is still. LYCIDAS is dead, not quite ere his prime, but in what, had fate been kinder, should have been the fulness of his rich gifts.

The House knew GRANDOLPH, as he presented himself to its notice from various points of view. First, an unknown new Member, rising from bench immediately behind Ministers, a situation which, deliberately chosen, seemed to observant Whips to indicate pleasurable prospect of docility. Next, whilst his Party was still in office, he popped up from front bench below gangway, and pricked at ponderous hide of SCLATER-BOOTH, pink of respectability, sublimation of county-gentry-Toryism. Then, with sudden brilliancy and sustained force, he rose on the firmament below the gangway in Opposition, tilting almost single-handed at the panoplied host, a majority over a hundred strong, that seemed to make Mr. G.'s second Administration invulnerable. For a moment in a famous night in June he was seen standing jubilant on his seat at the corner of the bench, waving his hat, shouting himself hoarse with cries of victory. From this elevation he sprang lightly on to the Treasury Bench, and astonished Members who, with him, had heard the chimes at midnight and after, by the quiet dignity of his manner, his unerring tact, his unfailing skill of management. Never since the time _Prince Hal_, boon companion of _Falstaff_, became _King Henry the Fifth_, has there been seen such transformation.

Never was such a sudden scholar made; Never came reformation in a flood, With such a heady currance, scouring faults; Nor never Hydra-headed wilfulness So soon did lose his seat, and all at once, As in this king.

The succeeding Session had a fresh surprise. It found our GRANDOLPH, self-reduced to the ranks, caressing his moustache on the corner seat behind the Treasury Bench. After a while he wearied of the invidious position, and went off to the races, to Norway a-fishing, to South Africa to observe the ways of lions from precarious proximity. But his heart was, after all, at Westminster. He came back broken in health, undaunted in spirit. Nothing pluckier, nothing more pathetic seen in the House than his long stubborn fight against the paralysis that crept over him even as he stood at the table and tried to weave again the magic spell by which he once held the House.

He died as he lived, fighting, keeping Death at arm's length for a full month after the highest authorities had said it was a mistake to be such an unconscionably long time in dying.

The House of Commons will know GRANDOLPH no more. But it will never forget one who will through all time rank among the most brilliant of its sons.

* * *

Something decidedly hysterical about jubilation of the hour. Prevalent hilarity suggests case of crowded passenger ship, having been in imminent danger of shipwreck, suddenly steams into comparatively placid seas.

"If," says WILFRID LAWSON, an authority on Church matters, "it were customary to commence the Session by singing a hymn I know what SQUIRE OF MALWOOD would give out. It's the one beginning

And are we still alive And see each other's face?

Thought it was to be all over before Christmas; Cabinet broken up; everybody retiring; Parliament dissolved; demoralised Party finally smashed up at polls; the other side left to settle who was to be who in best of all Governments. 'Instead of which,' as the Judge said, here we are in for a long Session, with, as usual, more work on hand than could be done in two."

"So you haven't resigned after all?" I remarked, getting up on a chair to have a chat with the SQUIRE OF MALWOOD.

"_Et tu_, TOBY!" he cried. "I thought better of your intelligence. I welcome re-opening of Session for one thing. Obliged to be in my place every night. Whilst House is sitting people will see I haven't resigned. That should--don't know that it will--check to certain extent what at Derby I ventured distantly to allude to as mendacious inventions. I have, as you know, had a somewhat troublesome time during recess. Rarely got up in morning but found by newspapers I had resigned overnight. Seldom went to bed without conviction derived from glancing over evening papers that I had upset the Ministerial coach--I, the mildest mannered man that ever sat in Cabinet Council. Daresay you remember incident in almost equally troubled career of LOUIS THE SIXTEENTH. When he was brought back to Paris and lodged in Tuileries after his flight to Varennes, the _sans-culottes_, _Messieurs et Madames_, could not sleep in their beds at night from apprehension that king had again escaped. They used to make up little family parties, stroll down to Tuileries, mass themselves before the King's bedroom window, and call upon LOUIS CAPET to show himself. The King thereupon got out of bed, put on red Cap of Liberty and showed himself at the window. '_Mes enfants_,' he said, 'you see I am here.' '_Très bien_,' said _Monsieur_, _Madame_, _et le Bébé_, and trudged back content to the Faubourg St. Antoine. Now that was all very well for a King. But you know, TOBY, it can't be expected of me in so-called holiday times to be constantly attending knocks at the front door, or even getting up in the dead of night, showing myself at the window, and saying, 'My good newspaper friends, I have not resigned.'"

_Business done._--Just commenced.

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"THE PORTRAIT OF NOBODY."--When the signature "[Greek: Outis]" first appeared to a pamphlet or an article, people wondered "who 'tis?" and "'ow 'tis he knows all about it?" The signature appearing again to an article in _The New Review_, No. 69, suggests that though the author has an anti-scriptural objection to a single-eyed individual, perhaps '[Greek: Outis]' simply indicates a person who, with the majority of us, detests an egotist. Only one would hardly gather this explanation of the assumption of this classic and poetic signature from the style of the article.

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NOT A GILT-EDGED SECURITY.--The investment of Wei-hai-wei.

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TALL TALES OF SPORT AND ADVENTURE.

I.--THE PINK HIPPOPOTAMUS. (CONTINUED.)