oble Authors_.--The poor spinsters of the Minerva press can scarcely
support life by their labours, so completely are they driven out of the
market by the Lady Charlottes and the Lady Bettys; and a rhyming peer is
as common as a Birmingham button. It would take ten Horace Walpoles at
least to do justice to the living authors of the red book.

_Buying Books_.--Money is universally allowed to be the thing which all
men love best; and if a man buys a book, we may safely infer he thinks
well of it. What nobody buys, then, we may justly conclude is not worth
reading.

* * * * *

_On the Duchess of Devonshire's canvassing for Mr. Fox at the
Westminster Election._

Array'd in matchless beauty, Devon's fair
In Fox's favour takes a zealous part;
But, oh! where'er the pilferer comes beware,
She supplicates a vote, and steals a heart.

* * * * *

_Lines sent by a Surgeon, with a box of ointment, to a Lady who had an
inflamed eye._

The doctor's kindest wishes e'er attend
His beauteous patient, may he hope his friend;
And prays that no corrosive disappointment
May mar the lenient virtues of his ointment;
Of which, a bit not larger than a shot,
Or that more murd'rous thing, "a beauty spot,"
Warmed on the finger by the taper's ray,
Smear o'er the eye affected twice a day.
Proffer not gold--I swear by my degree,
From beauty's lily hand to take no fee;
No glittering trash be mine, I scorn such pelf,
The eye, when cured, will pay the debt itself.

* * * * *

George III. is said to have observed to a person who approached him in a
moment of personal restraint, indispensable in his situation, "Here you
see me _checkmated_."

* * * * *

OLD GRIMALDI.

The first Grimaldi celebrated on the stage, appeared at Paris about the
year 1735, when his athletic force and extraordinary agility procured
him the sobriquet of "Jambe de Fer," or iron-leg. In 1742, when Mahomet
Effendi, ambassador of the Porte, visited Paris, he was received with
the highest honour and utmost distinction; and the court having ordered
a performance for the Turk's entertainment, Grimaldi was commanded to
exert himself to effect that object. In obedience to his directions, in
making a surprising leap, his foot actually struck a lustre, placed high
from the stage, and one of the glass drops was t