from Victoria, L.C. & D., to the French Capital. It is to be a Third-class
Night Mail, though a Knight of the First Class can, of course, travel by it
should he be so disposed. Thirty shillings through fare for "a single;" but
as the tariff doesn't explicitly inform us whether the passenger will be
asked the question, "Married or single?" and so be charged accordingly, we
may presume that a margin is left for a little surprise. The train of Night
Mails--a kind of gay bachelor train, no females being of the party--is to
start at 8:15 P.M., and to be in Paris at 5:50 A.M.

* * * * *

DRAWING THE BADGER.

(_A Natural History Note_.)

[Illustration]

The Badger (_Meles-Taxus_) is at once one of the most inoffensive and (in
one sense) offensive of our few remaining British Carnivora. He is
described by NAPIER of Merchiston, in his _Book of Nature and of Man_, as a
"quiet nocturnal beast, but if much 'badgered' becoming obstinate, and
fighting to the last, in which it is a type of a large class of Britons,
who like to be let alone, but when ill used can fight."

That great new authority on Natural History, Mr. G.A. HENTY (author of
_Those Other Animals_), should be able to tell us much about the Badger.
Therewith he would be able, in his own favourite fashion, to "point a
moral" (against the Demogorgon Democracy), and "adorn a tale" (of laboured
waggery). He might find the subject as suggestive of sardonic chaff as
American women and Republican institutions.