nudged one another in the ribs as the quaint idea dawned upon them!
And how they must have laughed, too, on the Opening Day, when the
Guard of Honour, presenting arms, and the "Greenwich Boys" singing
"_Ye Mariners of England_," were drenched in the rain! And what a
capital notion it was on that occasion to put "the Representatives of
the Fourth Estate" (no doubt called by _them_, with many a sly twinkle
of the eye, "the Press Gang") into a pen that soon, thanks to a series
of water-spouts, assumed the appearance of a tank!

After leaving the Galleries, the Scribe and the Artist looked up at
the model of Eddystone Lighthouse, and entered a shed declared to be
an "Arctic Scene." Here they were reminded by the introduced ship
of those happy days of their boyhood spent in the toy-shops of the
Lowther Arcade. Next they visited the Panorama of Trafalgar, and
revelled in the carnage of a sea-fight that only required Margate in
the distance to be entirely convincing. They glanced at the arena, and
gazed with awe at the lake which is to be devoted to the manoeuvring
of miniature ironclads. It will be interesting to note whether these
mimic combats will hold their own in the coming season against the
introduction of capsized clowns, drenched old women, and comic police.
Keeping the best for the last, the Scribe and the Artist now entered
the model of the _Victory_--a really admirable exhibition. There they
saw before them the old battle-ship with its full equipment, as it
was in the days of NELSON--when that deathless hero expected every
Englishman (not excluding even those passing the Custom House--as
the Committee would say) "to _do_ his duty." To make the illusion
complete, the great sea-captain was observed dying in the cook-pit in
the agonies of wax. And to think that this work was executed by a firm
of house-decorators! Why, who would not, after this, have his back
drawing-room converted into the quarter-deck of the _Shannon_, and his