es as
proof (almost) positive of his or her innocence.

_G.P.O._ Your complaint shall receive consideration.

_G.P._ Again, thanks for your courtesy. But about these and many other
grievances, the same stereotyped answer has invariably been received.

_G.P.O._ Your complaint shall receive consideration.

_G.P._ Exactly! That is the very answer. And it is felt that no other
outcome will result from agitation. It seems utterly impossible to
make the officials in charge realise their responsibility to the
taxpayers.

_G.P.O._ Your complaint shall receive consideration.

_G.P._ Of course; the same parrot-cry! And it may be for years, and
it be for ever, before reform is introduced. The probability is, that
the present unsatisfactory condition of affairs may exist at St.
Martin's-le-Grand until the hour of doom.

_G.P.O._ Your complaint shall receive consideration.

* * * * *

REFLECTION BY A GENERAL READER.

I have been reading books wherein 'tis shown
(In diction autocratic, sour, un-civil),
That nothing can be absolutely known,
Save that the Universe is wholly evil!
And even this poor result is only plain
To Genius--which, of course, is quite a rarity.
_I_ should have thought this would have given it pain,
And moved it to both modesty and charity;
But what surprises _me_ (--ZOILUS, to mock sure,
Will whip me with sham-epigrams would-be witty,--)
Is that Agnostics seem so awfully pure,
And Pessimists so destitute of pity.

* * * * *

ANNALS OF A WATERING-PLACE

THAT HAS "SEEN ITS DAY."

[Illustration]

The weather which, in Mr. DUNSTABLE's varied experience of
five-and-twenty years, he assures me, has never been so bad,
having at length afforded some indications of "breaking" I make
the acquaintance, through Mrs. COBBLER, of Mr. WISTERWHISTLE, the
Proprietor of the one Bath-chair available for the invalid of
Torsington-on-Sea, who, like myself, stands in need of the salubrious
air of that health-giving resort, but who is ordered by his medical
adviser to secure it with the least possible expenditure of physical
strength.

[Illustration: A Mess Dinner.]

Both Mr. WISTERWHISTLE and his chair are peculiar in their respective
ways, and each has a decided history. Mr. WISTERWHISTLE, growing
confidential over his antecedents, says, "You see, Sir, I wasn't
brought up to the Bath-chair business, so to speak,