Quips and Quiddities: A Quintessence of Quirks, Quaint, Quizzical, and Quotable. Various

ISELY a woman prefers to a lover a man who neglects her. This one may love her some day; some day the lover will not.

      John Hay, Poems.

      

      

NE morning [Jerrold and Compton] proceeded together to view the pictures in the Gallery of Illustration. On entering the ante-room, they found themselves opposite to a number of very long looking-glasses. Pausing before one of these, [Compton] remarked to Jerrold, "You've come here to admire works of art! Very well, first feast your eyes on that work of nature!"—pointing to his own figure reflected in the glass; "look at it, there's a picture for you!" "Yes," said Jerrold, regarding it intently, "very fine, very fine indeed!" Then, turning to his friend: "Wants hanging, though!"

      Memoir of Henry Compton.

      

ING for the garish eye, When moonless brandlings cling! Let the froddering crooner cry, And the braddled sapster sing. For never, and never again, Will the tottering beechlings play, For bratticed wrackers are singing aloud, And the throngers croon in May!

      W. S. Gilbert.

      

YDNEY SMITH said of a certain quarrelsome person that his very face was a breach of the peace.

      J. T. Fields, Yesterdays with Authors.

      

      

ERCHIEF in hand I saw them stand; In every kerchief lurked a lunch; When they unfurl'd them it was grand To watch bronzed men and maidens crunch The sounding celery-stick, or ram The knife into the blushing ham. Dash'd the bold fork through pies of pork; O'er hard-boil'd eggs the saltspoon shook; Leapt from its lair the playful cork: Yet some there were, to whom the brook Seemed sweetest beverage, and for meat They chose the red root of the beet.

      C. S. Calverley, Fly Leaves.

      

F all virtues, magnanimity is the rarest. There are a hundred persons of merit for one who willingly acknowledges it in another.

      W. Hazlitt, Characteristics.

      

ISNESS first, pleasure artervards, as King Richard the Third said ven he stabbed the tother king in the Tower, afore he murdered the babbies.

      Charles Dickens, apud J. T. Fields.

      

E are all of us liable to this error of imagining that we are grieved at a fault, when we are only grieved at having done something to lower ourselves in our own estimation.

      E. M. Sewell, Margaret Percival.

      

      

TREMBLED once beneath her spell Whose spelling was extremely so-so.

      Frederick Locker, London Lyrics.

      

T'S easy finding reasons why other folks should be patient.

      Bartle Massey, in George Eliot's Adam Bede.

      OUR TRAVELLER.

      

F thou wouldst stand on Etna's burning brow, With smoke above, and roaring flames below; And gaze adown that molten gulf reveal'd Till thy soul shudder'd, and thy senses reel'd;— If thou wouldst beard Niagara in his pride, Or stem the billows of Propontic tide; Scale all alone some dizzy Alpine haut, And shriek "Excelsior!" amidst the snow;— Wouldst tempt all deaths, all dangers that may be, Perils by land, and perils on the sea— This vast round world, I say, if thou wouldst view it, Then why the dickens don't you go and do it?

      H. Cholmondeley Pennell, Puck on Pegasus.

      

AM saddest when I sing; so are those who hear me. They are sadder even than I am.

      C. F. Browne, Artemus Ward's Lecture.

      

      

N ape with a pliable thumb and big brain, When the gift of the gab he had managed to gain, As a lord of creation established his reign, Which nobody can deny. But I'm sadly afraid, if we do not take care, A relapse to low life may our prospects impair, So of beastly propensities let us beware, Which nobody can deny. Their lofty position our children may lose, And, reduced to all-fours, must then narrow their views, Which would shortly unfit them for wearing our shoes, Which nobody can deny. Their vertebræ next might be taken away, When they'd sink to an oyster, or insect, some day, Or the pitiful part of a polypus play, Which nobody can deny.

      Lord Neaves, Songs and Verses.

      

T'S dreadful to think on, people playing with their own insides in that way! And it's flying i' the face o' Providence; for what are the doctors for, if we aren't to call 'em in?

      Mrs. Pullet, in George Eliot's Mill on the Floss.

      

RIEF, in two rules he summed the ends of man— Keep all you have, and try for all you can!

      Lord Lytton, King Arthur.

      

      LOVE SONG.

      

HAT mistress half so dear as mine, Half so well dressed, so pungent, fragrant, Who can such attributes combine, To charm the constant, fix the vagrant? Who can display such varied arts, To suit the taste of saint and sinner, Who go so near to touch their hearts, As thou, my darling dainty dinner? Still my breast holds a rival queen, A bright-eyed nymph of sloping shoulders, Whose ruddy cheeks and graceful mien Entrance the sense of all beholders. Oh! when thy lips to mine are pressed, What transports titillate my throttle! My love can find new life and zest, In thee, and thee alone, my bottle!

      Horace Smith, The Tin Trumpet.

      

ASHION with us is like the man in one of Le Sage's novels, who was constantly changing his servants, and yet had but one suit of livery, which every newcomer, whether he was tall or short, fat or thin, was obliged to wear.

      Wormwood, in Lord Lytton's Pelham.

      

      

NMARKETABLE maidens of the mart, Who, plumpness gone, fine delicacy feint, And hide your sins in piety and paint.

      Alfred Austin, The Season.

      

EEING O. Smith, the popular melodramatic actor, on the opposite side of the Strand, Knowles rushed across the road, seized him by the hand, and inquired eagerly after his health. Smith, who only