om the Corporation behind a
laager of fruit-dishes and substantial ornaments.

If two gourmets fall out over the respective merits of their favourite
_entremets_, the remedy is now easy. There is the duel by button. Each of
the principals, seconded by his particular waiter, after carefully taking
his opponent's range and bearings, will suspire and hit him in the eye. The
more replete combatant, having the greater equatorial velocity, will
probably win, but the tailor can do a good deal towards securing a flat
trajectory and freedom from swerve.

At Christmas dinners, Tommy, when adequately charged, can challenge a rival
amateur of plum-pudding to a rally over the dessert, instead of expending
his horse-power over crackers. A little training, of course, would be
needed to secure a combine fusillade.

It is only right to add that evening-dress waistcoats are henceforward to
come under those sections of the Geneva Convention which relate to missiles
and explosives. No soft-nosed buttons, or studs which are liable to
"bunch," are to be allowed. A special regulation further requires that
persons more than fifty inches in circumference, and fire-eaters who have
already marked their men, shall dine by themselves, or at any rate only at
a high table where there is no _vis-a-vis_. And page-boys are to be
compelled to use hooks-and-eyes, unless they are engaged for a wedding or
funeral salvo.

ZIG-ZAG.

* * * * *

The Plural Voter.

"At the Wilmot-street Schools ... the credit of being first fell to a
well-known resident--a stone-mason by craft.... There was no mistaking
the colour of his political opinions. He voted for Major Sir Mathew
Wilson."--_Evening News._

"'I am going to be the first man in England who ever voted at 7 a.m.,'
said an enthusiastic workman at the Wilmot-street Station as he fell
in with the opening of the front door. He voted for
Masterman."--_Star._

* * * * *

A message recently sent to a New Zealand chemist:

"Please give the little girl a plaster for a man that a piece of wood
blew off a shed and hit him in the rib."

* * * * *

"BAY GELDING, 5 years, 16 h.p., up to 13 stone; hunted up to date;
good performer and temperate; quiet with road nuisances; 30 gs."

Thirty guineas for a 16 horse-power horse is absurd.

* *