ket,"
exclaimed a railway guard to a bandsman in the Volunteers returning from
a review. "Didna I tell ye I've lost it?" "Nonsense, man; feel in your
pockets, you cannot hae lost it." "Can I no?" was the drunken reply;
"man, that's naething, I've lost the big drum!"

MELANCHOLY ACCIDENT.--SINGULAR ACTION.

The _Annual Register_ contains the following interesting case. July 25,
1857.--At the Maidstone Assizes an action arising out of a singular and
melancholy accident was tried. The action, Shilling _v._ The Accidental
Insurance Company, was brought by Charlotte Shilling, widow and
administratrix of Thomas Shilling, to recover from the defendants the sum
of 2000 pounds, upon a policy effected by the deceased on the life of her
father-in-law, James Shilling. The husband of the plaintiff, Thomas
Shilling, carried on the business of a builder at Malling, a short
distance from Maidstone. His father, James Shilling, lived with him; he
was nearly 80 years old, and very infirm, and his son used to drive him
about occasionally in his pony chaise. In the month of March, last year,
an application was made to the defendants to effect two policies for 2000
pounds each upon the lives of Thomas Shilling and James Shilling, and to
secure that sum in the event of either of them dying from an accident,
and the policies were completed and delivered in the following month of
June. On the evening of the 11th of July, 1856, about half-past 7
o'clock, the father and son went from Malling with a pony and chaise, for
the purpose of proceeding to a stone quarry at Aylesford, where Thomas
Shilling had business to transact, and they never returned home again
alive. There where two roads by which they could have got to the quarry
from Malling, one of which was rather a dangerous one to be taken with a
vehicle and horse, on account of a steep bank leading to the river Medway
being on one side and the railway passing close to the other; but this
route, it appears, was much shorter than the other, which was nearly two
miles round, and it was consequently constantly used both by pedestrians
and carriages. About 8 o'clock the pony and chaise and the father and
son were seen on this road, and upon arriving at the gate leading to the
quarry, Thomas Shilling got out, leaving the pony and chaise in charge of
his father. Mr. Garnham, the owner of the quarry, was not at home, and
while one of the labourers was conversing with Thomas Shilli