Correspondent, A HOPEFUL AEDILE.

* * * * *

LEARNING THE LANGUAGE.

_A Page from his Bulgarian Ollendorff._

HAVE you perceived the Triumphal Arch at the entry of the City?

No, I have not perceived the Triumphal Arch at the entry of the City,
but I have noticed the cold shoulder of the Generals.

This must be the congratulatory Round Robin of the Officers.

Yes, it is the congratulatory Round Robin of the Officers, but here also
is the placard proclaiming me a Usurper.

Has the Snub arrived from the Porte?

Yes, the Snub has arrived from the Porte, and with it the Ultimatum from
the CZAR.

In any emergency would you depend upon the omnibus horse provided for
you by the War Department?

No, in any emergency I would not depend upon the omnibus horse provided
for me by the War Department, but on the list of trains proceeding to
the frontier, as furnished in the local _Bradshaw_.

* * * * *

[Illustration: NAUGHTICAL?

_Yachting Friend (playfully)._ "HAVE YOU ANY EXPERIENCE OF SQUALLS,
BROWN?"

_Brown._ "SQUALLS!" (_Seriously._) "MY DEAR SIR, I'VE BROUGHT UP TEN IN
FAMILY!"]

* * * * *

FOR AN IRISH TRIP.

(_Some Preparatory Memoranda._)

1. To get up the early Celtic history, and establish my undoubted right
to call myself an Irishman, by tracing my pedigree directly back to
FERGUS THE FIRST.

2. Lend colourable certainty to this by hiring a low-comedy Donnybrook
Fair suit from NATHAN'S, and wearing it on all public occasions.

3. Make arrangements to take a dozen lessons in jig-dancing and
shillelagh-flourishing from some recognised Music-Hall celebrity engaged
in this special line of business.

4. Get the words of the _We'll have the Tail off the Cow, Pat_, and
other patriotic songs, by heart, and have an encore verse ready in case
of being called upon to give it in any popular emergency.

5. Familiarise myself with the use of such expressions as "Whist!
Whist!" "Arrah! are ye shure now," "divil a bit!" and other Irish
colloquialisms, and accustom myself to interspersing my orations with
shrill whoops to give emphasis to a sentence or point to a period as
occasion may require or suggest.

6. Conceive a defence of boycotting and bring it oratorically, in an
airy and genial way, within a measurable distance of legality, and back
it up if possible with some biblical and Homeric analogies.

7. St