e the people are starving in the streets and highways.
_We_ know that the heart of the compassionate _old rat_ bleeds for the
distresses of the nation, and that he is at this moment living upon bread
and water, and studying Lord John Russell's hints on the Corn-laws, in

[Illustration: THE MONASTERY OF LA TRAPPE.]

* * * * *

DOMESTIC ECONOMY.

Said Stiggins to his wife one day,
"We've nothing left to eat;
If things go on in this queer way,
We shan't make _both ends meet._"

The dame replied, in words discreet,
"We're not so badly fed,
If we can make but _one_ end _meat_,
And make the other _bread_."

* * * * *

NIGGER PECULIARITIES.

Perhaps no race of people on the face of the habitable globe are so
strongly imbued with individual peculiarities as the free and slave negro
population of the United States. Out-heroding Herod in their monstrous
attempts of imitating and exceeding the fashions of the whites, the
emulative "Darkies" may be seen on Sundays occupying the whole extent of
the Broadway pavement, dressed in fashions carried to the very sublime of
the ridiculous. Whatever is the order of the day, the highest _ton_ among
the whites is instantly adopted, with the most ludicrous exaggeration, by
the blacks: if small brims be worn by the beaus of the former, they
degenerate to nothing on the skulls of the latter; if width be the order
of the day, the coloured gentlemen rush out in unmeasurable umbrellas of
felt, straw, and gossamer. A long-tailed white is, in comparison, but a
docked black. Should muslin trip from a carriage, tucked or flounced to
the knee, the same material, sported by a sable belle, will take its next
Sunday out fur-belowed from hip to heel. Parasols are parachutes; sandals,
black bandages; large bonnets, straw sheds, and small ones, nonentities.
So it is with colours: green becomes more green, blue more blue, orange
more orange, and crimson more flaming, when sported by these ebon slaves
of deep-rooted vanity.

The spirit of imitation manifests itself in all their actions: hence it is
by no means an uncommon occurrence to see a tall, round-shouldered,
woolly-headed, buck-shinned, and inky-complexioned "Free Nigger,"
sauntering out on Sunday, shading his huge weather-proof face from the
rays of the encroaching sun under a carefully-carried silk umbrella! And
again, as in many of the places of wors