NNET
A LITTLE. I'VE TAKEN OUT THE PINS."]

* * * * *

ONE TOO MANY FOR HIM.

SIGNOR SMITHINI _loquitur_:--

_Houp-la!_ Oh, it's all very fine
That there whip to keep twirling and cracking,
But with such a trio as mine
There's no very great fun in "bare-backing."
Two of them, I'm sure, were enough
To keep--in _this_ Circus--in tether.
A third you must thrust in!--what stuff!
How _am_ I to keep 'em together?
"Land Purchase" I had well in hand,
And "Tithes" made a pretty fair second;
But t'other? I can't understand
How JOKIM could so have misreckoned.
Of all awkward 'osses to hold
The worst is his pet, "Compensation,"
And if in the tan I ain't rolled,
'Twill be thanks to my fine equitation!
_Must_ get him along? Oh, of course!
It will not do to fail, now we've started.
But how? I'm a chap of resource,
And I fancy I'm not chicken-hearted,
Yet some lookers-on shouts out "Go!"
Whilst others ejaculate "Drop him!"
And, SOLLY, I'm hanged if I know
How safely to drive him _or_ stop him.
I may get him round,--'twill take time,--
To drop him would now raise derision;
I'm tired, and not quite in my prime,
And of failure have somehow a vision.
Of course, I will still do my best;
I am always devoted to "Duty,"
But oh! I should so like a rest.
_Houp-la_ then! Oh, come up, you beauty!!

* * * * *

IMPORTANT.--The Two Pins Club are going to have a race. Of course it
will be "from point to point."

* * * * *

LE 'OCKEY STICK-BALLE FIGHT.

_Contributed by Our Own "Sportings-Life" Man._

MON CHER MONSIEUR PUNCH,

I KNOW what interest profound and gracious you have always manifested
towards the glorious efforts of the heroic youth of our regenerated
athletic France, for have I not read your notices amiable and
scientific of _les_ "doings" of our onze at the _jeu de Cricquette_,
and still later of the murderous combat of the veritable
"struggle-for-lifers" in _le scrimmage_ of your terrible contest of
"Kicke-balle"? But now the valiant youth of our public seminaries have
advanced still one more step, and the afternoon of last Tuesday saw,
in the leafy arcades of our Bois, a true "stick-balle" fight--in one
word, a _parti_ of "Le 'Ockey," played with _vrais batons_, clubs long
and terrible, with cruel hooked finish, to the eye