for sixpenny
people, and the penny folk are stowed away anywhere. Then, again, in
several programmes I have been at the pains to analyse, it is palpable
that, whilst the bulk of the extracts fire over the heads of the poor
people, one or two are inserted which are as studiously aimed at them as
the parson's remarks in last Sunday's sermon against public-house
loafing. Still "naming no names," I attended some readings where one of
the clergy read a long extract from Bailey's "Festus," whilst he was
succeeded by a vulgar fellow, evidently put in for "the gods," who
delivered himself of a parody on Ingoldsby, full of the coarsest
slang--nay, worse than that, abounding in immoralities which, I hope,
made the parochial clergy sit on thorns, and place the reader on their
"Index Expurgatorius" from henceforth.

Excellent in its original design, the movement is obviously degenerating
into something widely different. First, I would say, Let your Penny
Readings be really Penny Readings, and not the egregious _lucus a non_
they now are. If there is any distinction, the penny people should have
the stalls, and then, _if there were room_, the "swells" (I must use an
offensive term) could come in for sixpence, and stand at the back. But
there should be no difference at all. Dives and Lazarus should sit
together, or Dives stop away if he were afraid his fine linen may get
soiled. Lazarus, at all events, must not be lost sight of, or treated to
second best. The experiment of thus mingling them has been tried, I
know, and succeeds admirably. Dives and Lazarus _do_ hobnob; and though
the former occasionally tenders a silver coin for his entree, he does
not feel that he is thereby entitled to a better seat. The committee
gets the benefit of his liberality; and when the accounts are audited in
the spring, Lazarus is immensely pleased at the figure his pence make.
Then, again, as to the quality of the entertainment. Let us remember
Lazarus comes there to be elevated. That was the theory we set out
with--that we, by our reading, or our singing, or fiddling, or
tootle-tooing on the cornet, could civilize our friend in fustian. Do
not let us fall into the mistake, then, of descending to his standard.
We want to level him up to ours. Give him the music we play in our own
drawing-rooms; read the choice bits of fiction or poetry to his wife and
daughters which we should select for our own. Amuse his poor little
children with the same innocent no