* * * * *

AFTER LUNCH.

A FANCY SKETCH, COPIED FROM COBB.

["There are numerous instances of Members of the legal profession having acquired habits of intemperance in consequence of the facilities for procuring alcoholic drinks in the building, and the difficulty of obtaining tea and coffee.”—­Cobb, on the Refreshment Bars of the Law Courts.]

    SCENE—­Apartment in the Chancery Division.  Time, 2.15 P.M. 
    Judge, Bar, Solicitors, and Public discovered in a state
    more easily imagined (by Mr. COBB) than described.

Judge (thickly).  What want t’know—­what-do-next? (Smiles.) Very hot!  Very hot indeed! [Frowns.

First Q.C. (rising unsteadily).  P’raps m’Lord let m’explain!  Case of Brown-versus-Smith, should say—­course—­Smith-versus-Brown. (Smiles.) Absurd!  Can’t-say-more! [Sits down abruptly.

Judge (angrily).  Very irregular this!  Commit—­contempt—­Court!

Second Q.C. (leaning luxuriously on desk).  P’raps m’Lord let me explain.  Learned friend—­drunk! [Disappears under his seat.

Judge (angrily, to Second Q.C.) So you! so everybody! (With maudlin tenderness.) Must respect Court! (Savagely.) You are all disgusting—­disgustingly—­’tosticated!  Adjourn—­morrow mornin’.  Usher, brandy sodah! [Scene closes in—­fortunately!

* * * * *

ESSENCE OF PARLIAMENT.

EXTRACTED FROM THE DIARY OF TOBY, M.P.

House of Commons, Monday, July 27.—­Quite like old times to-night.  Public business interrupted, and private Member suspended.  The victim is ATKINSON, Member for Boston; been on the rampage all last week; a terror to the Clerks’ table; haunting the SPEAKER’s Chair, and making the Sergeant-at-Arms’s flesh creep.  Decidedly inconvenient to have a gentleman with pale salmon neck-tie and white waistcoat, suddenly popping his head round SPEAKER’s Chair, and crying, “Ah, ah!” “No, you don’t!” “Would you, then?” and other discursive remarks.  Curious how ATKINSON, indulging in these luxuries himself; hotly resents attempts by others to enjoy similar exotics of conversation.  Narrating his grievances just now, he dwelt with especial fervour on one of them.  “One of the Clerks,” he told the House, “when I showed him a Motion, said, ‘Oh! oh!’ I said, ‘Don’t say “Oh! oh!” to me.’”

[Illustration:  “No Hankey-Pankey with me.”]

“Why not?” asked HANKEY, with that direct, almost abrupt manner that becomes a Magistrate for Surrey and Chairman of the Consolidated Bank.  “Why not?  Are you to have monopoly of this simple interjection?  Are you to appropriate all the O’s in the alphabet?  Is not a Clerk at the Table a man and a brother, and why may he not, if the idea flashes across his active brain, say, ’Oh! oh!’?”