SONG TO BE SUNG AT THE RECEPTION OF M. ALPHONSE DAUDET (_when he comes, and may it be soon!_).--"We all love "JACK""!
FOR GRAMMARIANS.--The latest Oxymoron;--the new Pianist, Herr SAUER, playing a "_suite_."
THE CHRONICLES OF A RURAL PARISH.
IV.--ELECTIONEERING.
WHATEVER, my wife may think about my public meeting, and whatever I may feel about it myself, one thing is quite certain--that it has left Mudford a very different village from what it found it. When I commenced my great efforts in the cause of citizenship there was apathy and ignorance amongst the "idiots"--as my friend Miss PHIL. BURTT insists on calling the villagers. Things travel quickly nowadays, and at the present moment we are all ablaze with the excitement of electioneering.
I ought to say at once that I have taken as yet no steps in my own candidature. I feel that, after the part I have played in the great Drama of Village Home Rule, the next move ought to come from a grateful and appreciative peasantry. In point of fact, I have been expecting every day, every hour almost, a deputation to ask me to allow myself to be put in nomination--I fancy that"s the correct phrase. So far the deputations have been as conspicuous by their absence _since_ the meeting as they were annoying by their frequency _before_. Another curious fact I have noticed in this. We are to have a Parish Council of seven. Thus far I have heard of _exactly seven candidates and no more_.
This means that when I am nominated, as I shall be, of course, by all sections of the community (for I feel in my inward heart that it will be "all right on the night"), there will be only _one_ candidate too many. Who will be the unsuccessful one? I wonder!
Of the seven candidates, I should first mention Mrs. LETHAM HAVITT and Mrs. ARBLE MARCH. Both of these ladies have started a vigorous campaign, and--_mirabile dictu!_ (it makes one feel so literary to introduce every now and again a tag of Latin)--are running amicably together. At a Parliamentary election it"s a case of war to the knife, but now the lion lies down with the lamb; not that, for one single instant, would I insinuate that either is a lion, or, for the matter of that, a lamb. I should be ashamed to be so familiar. Mrs. HAVITT"S placards are everywhere on the walls. The effect of contrasts is at times surprising. For instance--
USE BANANA SOAP LETHAM HAVITT FOR THE PARISH COUNCIL.
Mrs. ARBLE MARCH is no less enterprising, and has purple appeals to you to vote for "the March of Progress," and "the March of Ideas." It may be very funny, but I have no patience with making a joke of such a serious matter. No one, at any rate, can ever accuse me of being intentionally funny.
It is announced from the Hall that the Squire has very kindly consented to stand; the Vicar follows his neighbour"s example, and will no doubt be returned, if for nothing else, as a compliment to his two charming daughters. (I think I must ask them to canva.s.s for me when I come out.
My wife declares _she_ won"t, and that she won"t let my girls either.) That makes four candidates. The other three are BLACK BOB and two of his mates, who are claiming support as the "People"s Three."
And now comes, perhaps, the most extraordinary thing of all--their programme! I find that it is full of the most (so-called) advanced ideas, but that the plank which seems to be the most attractive is "Free Trout-fishing!" I confess I could hardly believe my own eyes when I read it. In the first place, it seemed so farcical. In the second place, the only trout-fishing in the neighbourhood happens to _belong_ to ME! What"s more, I don"t see any way out of the difficulty. I met BLACK BOB a day or two ago and asked him how he ever got such an absurd notion into his head that the Parish Council had anything to do with trout-fishing. "It"s all right, Mr. WINKINS," said he, "just remember what Section 8 says." I said nothing at the time, because I thought as a fact that that section referred to Boards of Guardians. When I looked at the Act, sure enough I read, as being one of the powers possessed by the Parish Council--
"(_e_) _To utilise any_ well, spring, or _stream within their parish_"....
I read no more. I had read enough. How any Parliament can ever have dared to insert such a monstrous section I cannot understand. But there it is. "Free trout-fishing!" Well--there ought to be someone on the Parish Council to defend the rights of property. I shall be the man.
Next Tuesday the Parish Meeting in the Voluntary Schoolroom at 7.30. It cannot fail to be an eventful night.
Room-attics.
["Madame PATTI caught cold in a damp artist"s room."
--_Weekly Paper._]
O MOIST, unpleasant artist, you were surely overbold When your rheum--(corrected spelling)--gave our nightingale a cold.
When thermometers are falling you"ll discover to your cost That a singer who has started damp is bound to be a "frost."
NOT A GOOD NAME.--It came out in the HARDING-c.o.x divorce suit that "MCNAB" was the Scotch equivalent in hotel visitors" books for "SMITH"
or "JONES." It may be equivalent, but it isn"t good for "MCNAB"; as where SMITH and JONES might get off, the Scotchman would be "McNabb"d."
FIRST IMPRESSIONS.
(CONTINUED.)
[Ill.u.s.tration]
Let me collect my scattered senses! Where am I? In Pitti Palace. On narrow staircase. Probably on forbidden ground. I hear footfall-- descending. Perhaps it may be one of the officials, and I shall be caught in the act of attempting to enter the royal attics! What would be the punishment? Death, or penal servitude? The gallows or the galleys? Have happily several one-lira notes in my pocket. If these are not sufficient, five lire, or even ten----But I shall see what sort of man he is. Perhaps a few coppers would be enough. At this moment the obstruction descends, and I discover that he is a fat German tourist.
For the first time in my life am pleased to look at a German, though the cut of this one"s clothes is even worse than usual. Feel inclined to fall upon his neck and murmur "_Mahlzeit!_" or "_Prosit!_" or some other idiotic exclamation peculiar to his country. Fortunately, remember that these are only said in connection with eating or drinking. Perhaps, if I were to remind him of drink, after he has spent hours in a dry, hot gallery, it would not tend to conciliate him.
Therefore muster up the half-dozen words of his awful language which years of anxious study have enabled me to master in all their complexities of gender, number, case, declension, conjugation, agreement, government, &c.--not forgetting the exceptions--and, taking off my hat, ask him if this is the entrance to the galleries. "_Ja wohl_," says he. And moreover if I go up these stairs to the top. "_Ja wohl_," says he again. Emboldened by his courteous affability, I remark that the staircase is very narrow. "_Ja wohl_," says he, for the third time, and pa.s.ses on. A very interesting conversation with an intelligent foreigner in a country where we are both strangers. There is nothing like travel to enlarge the mind. Besides, one learns so much of foreign languages when one hears the varied idioms and phrases of the natives.
Thus meditating I arrive at the top of the ladder. What a smell of paint! They are evidently doing up the palace. Turn along a pa.s.sage about two feet wide--how that German got through it has puzzled me ever since--and find myself in a magnificent studio, filled with painters, easels, palettes and canvases, and with the smell of paint. That German deceived me. I have come to the wrong place after all. Am just about to apologise and retreat when I perceived a fine old master on the wall.
Peeping amongst the painters, easels, palettes, and canvases, perceive other old masters, almost entirely hidden by the various erections of the students. At this moment an official rings a small bell. Ask him if I may be permitted to look at some of the pictures on the walls, if it would not be interfering with the painters. "Certainly, _signore_,"
says he. And ask him where the Pitti Gallery is. "It is here," says he.
What? I have reached it at last! But how can one see anything when the whole place is choked up with these execrable modern copies and the apparatus to support them? However, I will see what I can now that I have got here. Happily the daylight will last for at least another hour. "But," continues the official, as I meditate, "it is now four o"clock. The gallery is closed."
A FIRST IMPRESSIONIST.