of Termagans.* The tongue is a malignant member-had we the vice of punning, we should add member for Mon-mouth. To expose one's self to the tongue-battery of all the shrews and vixens, masculine and feminine, in Europe is much more valiant than discreet, particularly when one is not in a condition to make the speech of Master Petruchio.

Have I not in my time heard lions roar?

Have I not heard the sea, puffed up with winds,
Rage like an angry boar, chafed with sweat?
Have I not heard great ordnance in the field,
And heaven's artillery thunder in the skies?
And do you tell me of a woman's tongue?

We have not (thanks to Providence!) ever heard the roaring of so much as a lion's cub, save from within the bars of an iron cage; nor ever encountered a tempest at sea, or heard the shot of a cannon, save at a review, or a salute; but we have known men who have heard with their ears, and heard, unshaken, all these, and many more horrible and tremendous noises; yet has a single note of Xantippe's organ quite unmanned them. He that is a Daniel in a den of lions, a Turenne before a park of cannon, and a Nelson in the Bay of Biscay, quivers like an aspen-leaf before his shrew. Hers is the "deep and dreadful organpipe." She scolds, and tornados are unheard. She lectures, and

Earthquakes rush unheededly away.

ON THE PORTRAIT OF A LADY.

TAKEN BY THE DAGUERROTYPE.

YES, there are her features! her brow, and her hair,
And her eyes, with a look so seraphic,

Her nose, and her mouth, with the smile that is there,
Truly caught by the Art Photographic !

Yet why should she borrow such aid of the skies,
When, by many a bosom's confession,

Her own lovely face, and the light of her eyes,

Are sufficient to make an impression?

H.

*"Termagans, a kind of heathen deity, extremely vociferous and turbulent in the ancient fairs and puppet-shows." Johnson. The word is Saxon: originally signifying "thrice powerful." The resemblance to Tris-megistus is remarkable. Termagant is both male and female. Instances of both genders will occur to everybody.

A HARD CASE.

BY THE EDITOR.

"Who shall decide when doctors disagree?"

'Tis with their judgments as their watches, none
Go just alike, but each believes his own.-POPE.

THAT Doctors differ, has become a common proverb; and truly, considering the peculiar disadvantages under which they labour, their variances are less wonders than matters of course. If any man works in the dark, like a mole, it is the Physician. He has continually, as it were, to divine the colour of a pig in a poke—or a cat in the bag. He is called in to a suspected trunk without the policeman's privilege of a search. He is expected to pass judgment on a physical tragedy going on in the house of life, without the critic's free admission to the performance. He is tasked to set to rights a disordered economy, without, as the Scotch say, going "ben," and must guess at riddles hard as Samson's as to an animal with a honeycombed inside. In fact, every malady is an Enigma, and when the doctor gives you over, he "gives it up."

A few weeks ago one of these puzzles, and a very intricate one, was proposed to the faculty at a metropolitan hospital. The disorder was desperate the patient writhed and groaned in agony-but his lights as usual threw none on the subject. In the meantime the case made à noise, and medical men of all degrees and descriptions, magnetizers, homoiopathists, hydropathists, mad doctors, sane doctors, quack doctors, and even horse doctors, flocked to the ward, inspected the symptoms, and then debated and disputed on the nature of the disease. It was in the brain, the heart, the liver, the nerves, the muscles, the skin, the blood, the kidneys, the "globes of the lungs,' "the momentum," "the pancras," "the capilaire vessels," and the "gutty sereny." Then for its nature; it was chronic, and acute, and intermittent, and non-contagious, and "ketching," and "inflammable," and "heredittary," and "eclectic," and Lord knows what besides. However, the discussion ended in a complete wrangle, and every doctor being mounted on his own theory, never was there such a scene since the Grand Combat of Hobby-Horses at the end of Mr. Bayes's Rehearsal!

"It's in his STOMACH!" finally shouted the House-Surgeon,after the departing disputants,-"it's in his stomach !"

The poor patient, who in the interval had been listening between his groans, no sooner heard this decision than his head seemed twitched by a spasm, that also produced a violent wink of the left eye. At the same time he beckoned to the surgeon.

"You're all right, doctor-as right as a trivet."

"I know I am," said the surgeon, -"it's in your stomach."

"It is in my stomach, sure enough."

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Yes-flying gout"

"Flying what!" exclaimed the patient. "No, no sich luck, Doctor," and he made a sign for the surgeon to put his ear near his lips, "it's six Hogs and a Bull, and I've swaller'd 'em."

BAJAZET GAG; THE MANAGER IN SEARCH OF A “STAR.”

BY DOUGLAS JERROLD.

"Some bright, particular star!”—SHAKSPEARE.

CHAP. X.

"DUCKWEED," said Gag," as it isn't ten yet, suppose we make a night of it."

Duckweed smelling a supper, and with appetite doubtless sharpened by the eloquence of the "Phosphorics," replied with more than usual alacrity, "With all my heart, sir. What tavern shall we patro

nize ?"

"I have heard a great deal of the Shoulder of Mutton and Cat!"" said Gag.

"Why that's one of the public-houses where they desecrate the drama," answered Duckweed, with a sudden animation, "one of those low hostelries where plays, operas, and farces are put off with sixpenn'orths of gin-and-water.'

We

"Exactly," said Gag. "We'll have six-penn'orth of whatever may be offered. Who knows? Something may turn up there. may find some gem of purest ray serene.' The house, I'm told, is famous for purl."

"I never drink it," said Duckweed, resolved in his disappointment of more costly entertainment to be insensible to the small joke of his manager. "At all events we shall be late, sir."

"Quite time enough to have a taste of their quality," said Gag; and, calling a cab, the manager and his man were speedily deposited at the door of the public-house, where each paid his sixpence and received a ticket which enabled the bearer to receive a glass of gin-and-water, either hot or cold, together with tragedy, comedy, singing, dancing on the tight rope, and gymnastic exercise by the "Youths of Mesopo

tamia.'

'Really, sir, a magnificent place," said Duckweed, struck with the size and splendour of the house. "And quite full too!

wonder that the real drama should decline, when—”

Who can

"Give your orders, gentlemen," said the waiter in a low voice,

with a significant glance at Duckweed.

"When there are such inducements for vulgar tippling, and—” "Give your orders," repeated the waiter.

"Hot, with sugar," said Duckweed-" and all the proper enjoyments of the senses. Here you may have Romeo and Juliet-" "With two kidneys," was the order of one of the audience to the attending garçon.

"Ha! ha!" cried Gag, winking at Duckweed, "I have seen Romeos and Juliets that might have been all the better swallowed with such recommendations."

"But, sir," said Duckweed, earnest in his defence of the dignity of the drama, "when we see our glorious profession made secondary, I may say, to the interests of the vintner and the cookshop-keeper-" Humph! I don't know," mused Gag. "I'm not certain, if the business don't improve, whether I shan't attack these fellows on their own ground. I think I shall make a dash at alamode beef!"

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Feb.- -VOL. LXIV. NO. CCLIV.

N

"Alamode beef! What, in the theatre ?" exclaimed Duckweed. "Why not? You see how the drama goes down when mixed with eating and drinking, and I'm not sure, that if we were to give alamode beef suppers to boxes and pit between the pieces-the half-price being confined to Welsh-rabbits-I'm not sure whether the experiment wouldn't considerably advance the true interests of the stage.' "At all events," observed the manager's man, you would knock down all such vulgar opposition as that before us. You would, of course, abolish the free list ?" added Duckweed.

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Except in the case of successful dramatists," answered the manager. "I hope I have still a proper sense of the majesty of dramatic literature."

"If you don't keep quiet there, mister, I'll have you bundled out," exclaimed an authoritative individual, projecting his head and shoulders from a side-box, and addressing himself to two of the audience, whose extreme vivacity bore testimony to the power of the landlord's alcohol.

"Who's that-who's that?" asked Gag.

"I thought everybody knew him," said one of the audience; "that's Mr. Quarts, the landlord: he always sits in that box, with one eye upon the actors and the other upon the waiters."

The curtain rose for the last new piece-a drama, it may be said, indigenous to the soil. It was called, "Anna Maria; or, the Licensed Victualler's Daughter," and was written, as the play-bill assured the reader, for the peculiar powers of a certain actress, no doubt one of the half-hundred "acknowledged heroines of domestic tragedy" with which the suburbs at the present happy moment abound. The plot was simple, but admirably adapted to call forth the characteristic energy of the lady artist. Anna Maria is in love with a London traveller, who, on his way to the Black Bull, the hostelry where, as Anna Maria informs us, she first saw the light,-is attacked by banditti, and robbed of all the cash he had been collecting in his journey for the London house. The traveller rushes into the bar, pale and distracted; he has lost the money; and knows not, as he eloquently complains, what suspicions may be cast upon his probity. Anna Maria soothes him-makes him sundry glasses of punch, which in a paroxysm of passion he swallows-and finally sings and dances him to sleep. He is then carried to bed by the ostler and waiter; and in the next scene we behold Anna Maria dressed in her lover's clothes, and armed with her father's blunderbuss, taken from the chimney-piece, resolved to seize the robber, or " perish in the attempt!" She of course succeeds, and we see her dragging the captain of the banditti, whom she has mortally wounded, into the Black Bull's back parlour. Here, candles being brought, the robber turns out to be Anna Maria's own father; and the Licensed Victualler's Daughter, as in filial duty bound, dies very mad.

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Upon my soul there's some strong stuff about it," said Duckweed, as the curtain fell, and the audience loudly applauded. "The idea isn't bad."

"We must find out the author," said Gag, to Duckweed's passing annoyance; for the manager's man trembled at the thought of a rival.

He, however, veiled his fears, and with affected liberality observed,

"It would be a great charity to take so promising a young man from such a place. Isn't it melancholy, sir, to see so many people drinking spirits and water in a theatre-isn't it the ruin of the drama?"

"Why it may suit our purpose to preach so," replied Gag, with rare candour; "but between ourselves, Duckweed, 'tis nothing of the sort. The real question is not how much more people drink in a place like this-but how much less, were there no such house of mixed entertainment. How many of these would be sotting in parlours, who are now getting a taste for more rational amusement? Many of these would never have gone to a theatre, and thus we see the theatre has been brought to them. Again, see how decorously all things are managed. Is there more hubbub than in my pit? The piece we have seen is quite as rational, and certainly quite as moral, as many a drama stamped with the authority of the Lord Chamberlain for two guineas. And then the dresses and appointments-the splendour of the building -is not everything in good taste, everything calculated to insensibly refine the mind of the mass; and more, are not places like these happily antagonistic-yes, Mr. Duckweed, antagonistic is the word-to that cold, destructive, uncharitable spirit of sectarianism that, warring with even the most innocent graces of life, would strip humanity of its harmless frills and ruffles, and clothe it in a shirt of hedgehog? Sir, I never see an Italian image merchant, with his Graces and Venuses and Apollos, at sixpence a-head, that I do not spiritually touch my hat to him. It is he who has carried refinement into the poor man's houseit is he who has accustomed the eyes of the multitude to the harmonious forms of beauty. Where, sir,-where are your green plaster parrots and spotted cats, that some years since decorated the shelves of the mechanic and the small tradesman ?-the idols of vile taste are gone, shivered to pieces, and the Italian boys-who have vended immortal loveliness for pence-have shattered the abominations. Now sir, this splendid theatre," and Gag looked around him, "built expressly for the million, tends to make the million dramatic. The pieces played are mostly licensed by the Chamberlain, the actors are in many instances equally good with my own, for a peep at whom I charge more than double; and as for the enormity of taking a glass of grog and a drama at the same time, why the difference between Mr. Quarts and myself is this-Mr. Quarts serves his customers in the pit and boxes-I serve mine in the saloon. We both sell wine and spirits to the audience, only with me the audience have more trouble in getting 'em."

"Well, you do surprise me !" said Duckweed. "I never thought to hear you talk in this manner. I thought you at least would shut every one of these places up."

"As a manager I would," answered Gag; "in the same way that had I been a manufacturer of plaster parrots and spotted cats I would have packed off all the Italian boys; but I am speaking now, Mr. Duckweed, as a man," and Gag dilated himself, "as a philanthropist ; I am now, sir, speaking my true sentiments; but that is not a luxury every day to be enjoyed! Were I a statesman, sir, I would offer premiums for the introduction and invention of harmless popular amusements. I am, perhaps, about to surprise you, Mr. Duckweed; but do you know, that I conceive London-glorious London-to be a very dull and melancholy place?"