ow, in conclusion, considering that a breach of the law
is necessary to secure admission to the University, what would you
consider the most appropriate motto for the Institution?

_A._ "Honesty is not (at first) the best policy."

* * * * *

"BACK US UP!"--It is stated that, on the new School Board for the
Henley-in-Arden district, a Mr. H. BACCHUS has been elected. May
BACCHUS (and the classic "fat venison") never be absent from this
Board! Probably, nowadays, BACCHUS is a strong supporter of the
Temperance Movement, if not himself a Total Abstainer.

LETTERS TO ABSTRACTIONS.

No. XVIII.--TO FAILURE.

SIR,--Hitherto, I seem to have been submitting to you examples that
cannot properly be described as failures. This was not my purpose.
I wished rather to describe one or two characters whose ruin, to a
greater or smaller degree, you have compassed by your influence.
But some sprite seemed to take possession of my pen; my efforts were
unsuccessful, and I was led away from my original purpose. Perhaps
that is one of the penalties of addressing you. We shall see! In any
case let me proceed with my task as best I may.

It happened to me once--the date is immaterial--that after a
considerable absence, I returned to London. You know, perhaps, how it
fares with those who, for any length of time, become exiles from their
native land. All the institutions, the small no less than the great,
that go to make up our varied social life at home, become glorified as
it were, and loom larger through the mist of absence. They become part
and parcel of a traveller's patriotism, even if in his home-life he
took no part in them. I was due to return at the end of May, in time
for the Derby-day. I am not a racing-man. I had never seen the Derby
run, chiefly, I fancy, because I had never had any desire to see it.
But I remember that amongst my brother-exiles, I was being eternally
congratulated on the good luck that took me home in time for this
great national event. "What, you are going to be back by the end of
May," one of them would say; "why you'll be able to go to the Derby?"
So that in time, I came to accept this possibility as a specially
enviable feature of my home-coming. From that, to making up my mind to
go to the Derby was but a step, I took it, and on the great day I made
one of the mighty crowd on Epsom Downs. I don't remember much about
the race. I met many friends who asked me, as is comm