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A TRIPLE PLATFORM.

Among the memorials of the sectional conflict of 1861-5, is an American platform arranged to suit all parties. The first column is the Secession; the second, the Abolition platform; and the whole, read together, is the Democratic platform:

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LOYALTY, OR JACOBINISM?

This piece of amphibology was circulated among the United Irishmen, previous to the Rebellion of 1798. First, read the lines as they stand, then according to the numerals prefixed:

1. I love my country-but the king,

3. Above all men his praise I sing,

2. Destruction to his odious reign,

4. That plague of princes, Thomas Paine;

5. The royal banners are displayed,

7. And may success the standard aid

6. Defeat and ruin seize the cause

8. Of France her liberty and laws.

NON COMMITTAL,

NEAT EVASION.

Bishop Egerton, of Durham, avoided three impertinent questions by replying as follows:

1. What inheritance he received from his father?

"Not so much as he expected."

2. What was his lady's fortune?

"Less than was reported."

3. What was the value of his living of Ross?
"More than he made of it."

A PATRIOTIC TOAST.

Most readers will remember the story of a non-committal editor who, during the Presidential canvass of 1872, desiring to propitiate subscribers of both parties, hoisted the ticket of "Grandn" at the top of his column, thus giving those who took the paper their choice of interpretations between "Grant and Wilson" and "Greeley and Brown." A story turning on the same style of point-and probably quite as apocryphal-though the author labels it "historique "—is told of an army officers' mess in France. A brother-soldier from a neighboring detachment having come in, and a champenoise having been uncorked in his honor, "Gentlemen," said the guest, raising his glass, "I am about to propose a toast at once patriotic and political." A chorus of hasty ejaculations and of murmurs at once greeted him. gentlemen," coolly proceeded the orator, "I drink to a thing which an object that-Bah! I will out with it at once. It begins with an R and ends with an e.'

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"Yes,

"Capital!" whispers a young lieutenant of Bordeaux promotion. "He proposes the République, without offending the old fogies by saying the word."

"Nonsense! He means the Radicale," replies the other, an old Captain Cassel.

"Upon my word," says a third, as he lifts his glass, "our friend must mean la Royauté."

"I see!" cries a one-legged veteran of Froschweiler: "we drink to la Revanche."

In fact the whole party drank the toast heartily, each interpreting it to his liking.

In the hands of a Swift, even so trivial an instance might be made to point a moral on the facility with which, alike in theology and politics-from Athanasian creed to Cincinnati. or Philadelphia platform-men comfortably interpret to their own diverse likings some doctrine that "begins with an R and ends with an e," and swallow it with great unanimity and enthusiasm.

THE HANDWRITING ON THE WALL.

During the war of the Rebellion, a merchant of Milwaukee, who is an excellent hand at sketching, drew most admirably on the wall of his store a negro's head, and underneath it wrote, in a manner worthy of the Delphic oracle, "Dis-Union for eber." Whether the sentence meant loyalty to the Union or not, was the puzzling question which the gentleman himself never answered, invariably stating to the inquirers, "Read it for yourselves, gentlemen." So from that day to this, as

the saying goes, war question."

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Another question is puzzling the young ladies who attend. a Western Female College. It seems that one of them discovered that some person had written on the outer wall of the college, "Young women should set good examples; for young men will follow them." The question that is now perplexing the heads of several of the young ladies of the college is, whether the writer meant what he or she (the handwriting was rather masculine) wrote, in a moral sense or in an ironical one.

HOW FRENCH ACTRESSES AVOID GIVING THEIR AGE.

A servant robbed Mlle. Mars of her diamonds one evening while she was at the theatre. Arrested, he was put upon trial, and witnesses were summoned to bear testimony to his guilt. Among these was Mlle. Mars. She was greatly an

noyed at this, as, according to the rules of French practice, the witness, after being sworn, gives his age. Now the age of Mlle. Mars was an impenetrable mystery, for it was a theme she never alluded to, and she possessed the art of arresting time's flight, or at least of repairing its ravages so effectually that her face never revealed acquaintance with more than twenty years. She was for some days evidently depressed; then, all at once, her spirits rose as buoyant as ever. This puzzled the court-for people in her eminent position always have a court; parasites are plenty in Paristhey did not know whether she had determined frankly to confess her age, or whether she had hit upon some means of eluding this thorny point of practice.

sion ?"

The day of trial came, and she was at her place. The court-room was filled, and when she was put in the witnessbox every ear was bent towards her to catch the age she would give as her own. "Your name?" said the presiding judge. "Anne Francoise Hippolyte Mars." "What is your profes"An actress of the French Comedy." "What is your age?" -ty years." "What?" inquired the presiding judge, leaning forward. "I have just told your honor!" replied the actress, giving one of those irresistible smiles which won the most hostile pit. The judge smiled in turn, and when he asked, as he did immediately, "Where do you live?" hearty applause long prevented Mlle. Mars from replying.

Mlle. Cico was summoned before a court to bear witness in favor of some cosmetic assailed as a poison by victims and their physicians. All the youngest actresses of Paris were there, and they reckoned upon a good deal of merriment and profit when Mlle. Cico came to disclose her age. She was called to the stand-sworn-gave her name and profession. When the judge said "How old are you?" she quitted the stand, went up to the bench, stood on tip-toe, and whispered in the judge's ear the malicious mystery. The bench smiled, and kept her secret.

The Cento.

A CENTO primarily signifies a cloak made of patches. In poetry it denotes a work wholly composed of verses, or passages promiscuously taken from other authors and disposed in a new form or order, so as to compose a new work and a new meaning. According to the rules laid down by Ausonius, the author of the celebrated Nuptial Cento, the pieces may be taken from the same poet, or from several; and the verses may be either taken entire, or divided into two, one half to be connected with another half taken elsewhere; but two verses are never to be taken together.

The Empress Eudoxia wrote the life of Jesus Christ in centos taken from Homer. Proba Falconia, and, long after him, Alexander Ross, both composed a life of the Saviour, in the same manner, from Virgil. The title of Ross' work, which was republished in 1769, was Virgilius Evangelizans, sive his toria Domini et Salvatoris nostri Jesu Christi Virgilianis verbis et versibus descripta.

Subjoined are some modern specimens of this literary confectionery, called in modern parlance

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