_Fair Visitor_. "DEAR ME! BUT AT SUCH A DISTANCE AS THAT--SURELY--"

_Miss Priscilla_. "AH, BUT WITH A _TELESCOPE_, YOU KNOW!"]

* * * * *

AT LAST!

(_JEREMIAD BY A MIDDLE-AGED MARTYR TO THE GREAT SEASIDE
SUPERSTITION._)

["To middle-aged people, at all events, nothing can be more
trying and deleterious than holidays."--_Daily News_.]

Oh, thanks to thee, thanks to thee, sage unconventional!
Heaven be blest, the truth's out, then, at last!
Holiday woes--'twould take volumes to mention all!--
Now, in the lump, meet a shrewd counterblast.
_Trying?_ Of course they are! _Most deleterious?_
Scribe, let me clasp thee, in thought, to this breast!
Holiday-hunting is Man's most mysterious,
Maddening guest!

_Quixote_, I swear, was a model of sanity,
When with the Holiday-seeker compared.
Fidgety folly, and fussy inanity.
These be the figments by which we are snared.
Soon as you're drawn from your own cosy drawing-room,
Far over flood, field, or foam--for your sins--
Then, when your breast makes for vulturine gnawing room,