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Fanny. Nasty, horrid things!

Uncle. Well, if you like better, diminutive water-insects; the water-flea and the cyclops and such. But I suppose you would wish to eschew mites. I mean not to eat them? Fanny. Oh yes, Uncle !

have lesser fleas; and so ad infinitum." Fleas are parasites. But gregarines are not fleas. Fanny. I should hope not. But what are they, then?

Uncle. "Little dark brown knots," my love, which "are seen at the free end of the hair, and may even be distinguished by the naked eye. These are gregarines." They are the discovery of a M. LINDEMANN, a Russian professor, whose country has doubtless afforded him a fine field for observation in this branch of zool

ogy.

Fanny. Zoology, Uncle?

knots are not inanimate objects.

Uncle. Yes, my dear. These little dark-brown

Fanny. Ugh!

Uncle. They "have a most ignoble ancestry and habitation, being found in the interior of "

Fanny. What? Uncle. Never mind. parasites of parasites.

They are, as I said, "They are not easily Uncle. Then you should examine your cheese. destroyed. They resist the effects of drying With this you can. Other things also, besides and even of boiling." Nothing, in short, but cheese. There is cheese — and there are chig-corrosive things that injure the hair will kill

nons.

"

Fanny. 'Chignons" and "cheese " " sounds funny.

Uncle. Yes, my dear. Alliteration. But cheese and chignons have more in common than Ch. However, you think chignons are "the cheese," eh?

Fanny. They are the fashion, Uncle, dear. Uncle. Yes; they are the fashion. So were "fronts" in my young days. Both false hair. Wise ladies then wore it before; now they wear it behind. The dandies of the day used, as they said, to quiz it.

Fanny. Quiz?

Uncle. Yes. It was one of their slang words - derived from looking through an eye-glass, called a quizzing-glass. Meant to inspect, as it were, and ridicule. Now, their successors, the swells, quiz chignons. But you can quiz your chignon yourself-with your microscope. Fanny. Why should I, Uncle?

Uncle. To see if it contains any gregarines. Fanny. Gregarines! Law, I should think they were pretty.

Uncle. No, my dear, they are parasites. Parasites of parasites.

Funny. Now, nonsense, Uncle. I know what a parasite is: "One who frequents rich tables, and earns his welcome by flattery." -DR.

JOHNSON.

Uncle. "The little fleas have other fleas, and smaller fleas to bite 'em. Those smaller fleas

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it ?

Uncle. Stay; wouldn't you like to examine

Fanny. No! There! (Flings it into the fire.) There's an end of it! Well done,

Uncle. And its inhabitants. FANNY! Let it blaze- with them. And now, by way of substitute for a chignon at your poll, to wear a chaplet, circlet, or whatever you call it, on your crown, here, take this bank-note. Now you will show that you have a taste of your own, and leave gregarious young ladies to wear chignons with gregarines.

(Scene closes.)

- Punch.

Prom Blackwood's Magazine.

HYMNS OF THE POPULACE.

construct scenes of vivid interest. They carefully record provincialisms and grammatical solecisms; they go into detail, coarse, homely, or simple, as it may be, It is a notorious difficulty for one class with a marvellous confidence of knowing. to put itself into the position of another, their ground. And all the while they are to adopt its tone of feeling, to comprehend the victims of illusions. We see two men its leading motives of action, its distinctive of equal powers for the work, and similar prejudices, prepossessions, and impulses; opportunities, arrive at diametrically oppoits likes and dislikes, and those constant site conclusions, according to their prepospervading influences which form character, sessions: and all for want of a key. They and lie at the root of the differences which know nothing of the world they affect to separate order from order, and keep them be familiar with from mere partial outside at such an impassable distance from real in- contact. They would not know how to actimacy. High and low, gentlemen and count for those distinct and often opposing artisans, master and servant, ladies and standards in morals; for the tolerance and poor folks, encounter one another at cer- the intolerance of public opinion which we tain points and in particular relations; but observe in the class called "the poor;" for the most discerning cannot pretend to see the position of women, and its points of into one another much beyond their point greater independence under a seeming subof contact. Employers, clergymen, benevo-jugation of brute force; for the different lent visitors, carry their own atmosphere models of what is attractive or excellent. with them wherever they go, and things They have no clue to the tastes and antipaare seen and coloured through its medium. thies which constitute the barrier we inIn their presence mutual interests are dis- dicate between poor and rich, and which, cussed from a non-natural point of view. once entertained, once rendered by habit a The minds of both parties relax out of a part of nature, can never be wholly eradicertain tension and artificial condition cated; so that the humbly-born, who have when removed from the contact and espion- risen in the world, whatever their powers, age of an unsympathising witness. This opportunities, or success in life, can never implies no design, no deception of any kind, see things with the eyes of those about probably no knowledge of check or im- them, can never rid themselves of the old pediment to a more perfect understanding. impressions-harden their hearts as they It is only that neither party can display any large or clear picture of themselves where the mind, to be informed, is so ill prepared to receive a comprehensive idea. Hence an inevitable mutual reticence. The superior must keep back something from the dependant; the most devoted pastor has an easy privacy he does not desire to admit his poorer flock into; the lady does not care that the humble object of her bounty should be able to picture her in the unrestraint of her drawing-room life; and in like manner the labourer, the "hand," the good woman that stands before her kindly visitant garrulously detailing her list of sorrows and grievances, have each an inner world from which it is impossible to lift up the curtain, or let in full daylight, so as to reveal all the motives, interests, notions, pains, and pleasures, which make up an individual and family life so hopelessly different in a thousand points from that unconsciously contrasted with it.

will against the memories of childhood, or struggle as they may from better motives to forget. Of course, so far as men act on the highest principles, they must be alike. The model king, subject, landlord, tenant, tradesman, and mechanic, noble virgin and simple cottage maiden, can all meet on a perfect understanding. There is but one highest motive. It is when motives of earth set in that confusion arises. It is the different alloys infused into our virtues by pride, vanity, selfishness, envy, jealousy, according to the calls upon them, that separate families and classes, and that give to each not only their distinctive faults, but their picturesque characteristics.

"The low light gives the colour,"

and character is made out of the presence of, or the temptation to, human error, and the degrees in which it is yielded to or resisted.

In spite of this difficulty, it is a favourite If this difficulty of a perfect understandexercise of fancy to picture the life of ing exists between all well-defined classes, classes with which the delineator has none it follows that the wider the difference of of the knowledge that comes of experience. social standing the greater the difficulty. In depicting the poor, for instance, writers This will, perhaps, be disputed, for many

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