mpensation Bill carried at early hour
this morning, after dull debate. Morning Sitting to-day for Supply.
Duller than ever. Dullest of all, JOKIM on Treasury Bench in charge of
Estimates.

[Illustration: Sympathy.]

"Yes, TOBY," he said, in reply to sympathetic greeting, "I _am_ a little
hipped; situation growing too heavy for me. Patriotism all very well;
public spirit desirable; self-abnegation, as OLD MORALITY says, is the
seed of virtue. But you may carry spirit of self-sacrifice too far. Read
my speech at dinner to HARTINGTON, of course? Put it in the right light,
don't you think? We Dissentient Liberals, as they call us, are the
Paschal Lambs of politics; except that, instead of being offered up as
sacrifice, we offer up ourselves. Still there are degrees. HARTINGTON
given up something; CHAMBERLAIN chucked himself away; JAMES might have
been on the Woolsack. But think of me, dear TOBY, and all I've
sacrificed. Four years ago a private Member, adrift from my Party; no
chance of reinstatement; not even sure of a seat. Now Chancellor of the
Exchequer, with L5000 a-year, and a pick of safe seats. Too much to
expect of me, TOBY; sometimes more than I can bear;" and JOKIM hid his
face in his copy of the Orders of the Day, whilst THEODORE FRY looking
on, was dissolved in tears.

_Business done._--Supply.

* * * * *

COMPLAINTS are often made as to the non-appreciation of jokes by those
to whom they are addressed. A Correspondent sends us on this subject the
following interesting remarks:--"I have made on an average ten jokes a
day for the last six years. Being in possession of a large independent
income, I could have afforded to make more, but I think ten a day a
reasonable number. I find that, as a rule, the wealthy and highly-placed
have absolutely no appreciation of humour. The necessitous, however,
show a keen taste for it. The other day a gentleman, whom I had only
seen once, asked me for the loan of a sovereign. I immediately made six
jokes running, and was rewarded by six successive peals of laughter. I
then informed him I had no money with me, and left him chuckling to
himself something about an Eastern coin of small value, called, I
believe, a dam."

* * * * *

NARROW ESCAPE OF AN R.A.!--Everyone knows that a Critic is one, who
would, professionally, roast and cut up his own father; but that some
Critics go beyond this, may be gathered from t