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[Illustration: THE WARNING OF THE BELLE

LOOK OUT FOR THE TRAIN]

* * * * *

PATRIOTIC ADORATION.

A TALE OF PHILADELPHIA.

People of the Quaker City,
How the world must stand aghast
At your wondrous veneration
For those relics of the past,
Kept in such precise condition,
Fostered with such tender care--
Don't, oh! don't the Philadelphians
Love old Independence Square?

Splendid are its walks and grass-plots
Where the bootblacks base-ball play,
And its seats resembling toad-stools,
On which loafers lounge all day,
Waiting for their luck, or gazing
At the office of the Mayor--
Don't, oh! don't the Philadelphians
Love old Independence Square?

Then, behold the fine old State-house
Cleanly kept inside and out,
Where the faithful office-holders
Squirt tobacco-juice about:
Placards highly ornamental
Decorate its outward wall--
Don't, oh! don't the Philadelphians
Love old Independence Hall?

O! ye gods and little fishes!
Could bill-sticker be so vile
As to paste up nasty posters
On the sacred classic pile?
Greece and Rome yet have their relics,
But what are they? very small.
Never half so venerated
As old Independence Hall.

* * * * *

PERIODICAL LITERATURE.

PUNCHINELLO has hitherto refrained from criticising the periodicals of
the day, from the mistaken idea that superlative excellence was not
expected in every number of every daily or weekly journal in the land.
He did not know that, if every such journal was not edited so as to suit
the comprehension of all classes of cursory critics, it should be
unqualifiedly condemned. Supposing that a painter should not condemn a
paper for publishing a musical article beyond his comprehension, and
that an architect ought not to get in a rage because he finds in his
favorite journal a paper on beavers which makes him feel insignificant,
PUNCHINELLO has generally looked around upon his fellow-journalists, and
thought them very good fellows, who generally published very good
papers. He did not find superlative excellence in any of their issues,
but then he did not look for it. He might as well pretend to look for
that in the journalists themselves, or in society at lar