ally to such light-fingered tactics.

I was additionally bewildered by a chorus chanted by one of the Society
Belles, which I took down _verbatim_, in the hope of a solution. It was
as follows: "For I like a good liar, indeed I do! Provided he comes out
with something new! But why did he tell me that story with whiskers on,
why, why, why?"

Now to me it is wholly incomprehensible that the female intelligence
should admire mendacity in the opposite sex on the sole conditions that
the said liar should present himself in some novel article of attire,
and, previously to relating his untruth, remove from his cheeks any
hirsute appendages. One of the boarders whom I consulted on the subject
attempted to persuade me that it was the _story_ that had the whiskers;
but it is nonsensical to suppose that a purely abstract affair like an
untruth could be furnished with capillary growth, which belongs to the
concrete department.

There was a lady described as an "incomparable Comedienne," who was the
victim of unexampled bad luck. For she had purchased a camera (which she
exhibited to the assembly), and with this she had gone about
photographing landscapes and other sceneries. But, lack-a-daisy! no
sooner were they printed than the pictures were discovered to be
irretrievably spoilt by objects in the foreground of such doubtful
propriety that they were not exactly fit to place among her brick-backs,
so she was compelled to keep them in a drawer among her knick-nacks!

I should have liked her to inform us where such a faulty mechanism was
procured, and why she did not exchange it for one of superior
competency.

She was succeeded on the stage by a little girl with a hoop, who bore a
striking resemblance to her predecessor, and was probably her infantile
daughter. This child was evidently of a greatly inquisitive disposition,
and asked many questions of her progenitors which they were unable to
answer, bidding her not to bother, and to go away and play.

Then she asked a juvenile boy (who remained invisible), called "JOHNNY
JONES," and informed us that "she knew now." But I was still in the
total darkness as to the answers, which even JESSIE declared that she
was "_Davus non Oedipus_," and not able to provide with the correct
solutions.

Upon the whole, I am of opinion that music-halls are more fertile in
mental puzzlement and social problems, and more difficult of
comprehension, than theatrical entertainments.

This is, no d