A VERY SOLEMN QUESTION.

"WHAT have I done?"

This is a tremendous query: a question besetting every man, woman, and child, at almost every step and turn of life. "What have I done? What a question for a man to put to himself, wakeful and restless, in the solitude of midnight sheets!

Last week, the EARL OF DERBY-his system gently stimulated by the LORD MAYOR'S roast and boiled-last week, the EARL OF DERBY asked this question of all the world; yes of all the word: for gentlemen of the press were there who would cause the query of the noble and chivalrous EARL to reverberate round about the world; and who was satisfactorily to make answer to it?

As he

The noble Earl, for the s cond time, touched upon the moral dignity of the masses at the DUKE's funeral. The innocent, unsophisticatedwe do not like to say, ignorant-Earl knew, it seems, so little of the people of England-(of the few millions who pay taxes, and drink beer when they can get it, and smoke coarse tobacco, and crack one another's skulls at quarter-staff, and bait bulls and draw badgers, and sby down Shrovetide cocks, and drown witches, and so forth, even as at the time of the early STANLEYS)-the Earl, it seems, knew so little of the rude and savage people, that, when he left his house on the 18 h of November, it must have been to him as though he was departing upon a very serious foreign discovery. passed through Temple Bar he must have become a little re-assured. But about Charing Cross and entering the Strand, he must have expected that the people-the mob-the hoggish multitude-would bave received the car with "hurrabs," and catcalls. That only for the soldiery, they would precipitate themselves upon the mourning coaches, stripping them of their velvet draperies and escutcheons. No MUNGO PARK, no CAPTAIN COOK could ever have been more surprised aud delighted at the pacific demeanour of savages whom the travellers expected to find cannibals: and lo! they were not men-eaters, but yam-eaters! Even so was it with the masses-the walls of men and women-that skirted the streets; and stood like patience in a gutter on the memorable 18 h. The EARL OF DERBY's head shrunk in its coronet, like a mouldy nut in its shell, in self-reproach. Hear, however, what-full of bashfulness and a little turtle, of humility and a drop of champagne-hear the EARL OF DERBY discourse concerning the people on that day.

"It is with feelings of self-humiliation that I ask myself, 'What have I done that I should hold so high a place among such a people?"" "What have I done for my place?" asks DERBY.

"What have I done ?" inquires DISRAELI.

"What have I done?" the while covered with blushe, stammers MALMSBURY.

weapons.

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Let the EARL OF DERBY take good heart-he has done a good deal. Men "do not (did not) hold so high a place among such a people" -even when men were exalted above the mob in the pillory-without doing a good deal for it. Now, it is a hard truth-but, to some statesmen, what is place but the pillory? True it is that so exalted, they may for the present have nothing but the sweets of salary and office showered upon them; but time presses, and hard-hearted history will spare not her ancient eggs. But what has DERBY done to stand so high? Why, for more than six years he talked and voted black, that, at the seventh, he might accept the black for white. It is chivalrous sport to destroy an opponent, only to possess and fight with his You have jumped from the attorney's stool-(and a noble jump too, if But what have I done?" asks MR. DISRAELI. Why, wonders. taken with a strong heart and a high object)-right upon the shoulders of the aristocracy. You are to an Ear), what JOCKO who has seen the world is to the dromedary Jocko is perched upon. Your tricks are numberless. You can crack epigrams like nuts, and fling the shells in the eyes of the folks surrounding. You can jabber about guns and soldiers, and marines and mortars, as much at home with them as any monkey, born and dwelling on the Rock of Gibraltar-but then, you must first empty a Frenchman's ink-horn into your stomach, like a dry pump, needing something to be poured in ere you begin to spout. 'What have I done?" asks the CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUER. And how all true men of pen-and-ink would have rejoiced to clap their hands, and cry "Bravely, my beautiful-my BEN!"

What have I done ?" cries MALMSBURY. Well, you have made a first-rate bow to the EMPEROR of AUSTRIA. If JOHN BULL had been a dancing-master, you could not have bowed longer and lower. You have swallowed Tuscan tyranny as though Tuscan tyranny had been Neapolitan macaroni. You have showered roses of speech upon NAPOLEON THE THIRD and BURGLAR THE GREAT; as though the aforesaid NAP. the III. and B. the G. had been the Imperial Beauty of the time, instead of that other thing with which in fairy tale at this writing-(was there ever such a Land of Flam as France ?)-the Beauty is companioned. With MALMSBURY for Foreign Minister, JOHN BULL has grimaced and shrugged like a French dancing-master-and BRITANNIA talked slip-slop to tyrants like any waiting-maid.

OUR STARS AND GARTERS IT is now become so common for Dukes and so forth to lecture at Mechanics' Institutions (we very much applaud the custom), that it is expected, by way of an equitable arrangement, a few lecturers by profession will be called to the Upper House. If a Duke takes a lecturer's chair, why may not the lecturer rest himself for awhile in the Duke's seat?

Many new noble lecturers are about to hold forth-and upon novel and excellent themes; no other than the history, political and social, of their own armorial bearings. The PREMIER (assisted by W. B.) will shortly deliver a lecture at Derby. (The lecture will be gratis; or no doubt FRAIL would be money-taker.) The noble Earlwith his arms painted in a very bright transparency is expected to be unusually eloquent. The pelican about to bleed herself will illustrate what the noble Earl may yet do for the farmers; whilst his motto, Sans change (without change!) will declare what he has done for them.

The EARL OF MALMESBURY has also a lecture prepared. His crest, a hedgehog, with the motto, Je le mainteindrois (I will maintain it) may be most felicitously applied. The hedgehog showing how, with almost a touch, the noble Earl may be completely doubled up.

Other lectures will be duly announced.

CABBY (politely)

VERY ACCOMMODATING.

A CABMAN'S GRATITUDE

FOR THE BUDGET.

COME, let us drink a health to BEN,
For he's a jolly chap,

At least to we and watermen,
For cheapnun of our tap;
That's if so be I ain't at fault-
For some is not quite clear-
By low'rin of the tax on malt
As he 'll bring down our beer.

Agin the tax on ouses, I

By no means will complain, Not if so be as when I'm dry,

I gits a double drain;

Cause vy?-the Bar my ome I count, Vere off the stand I'm found, Whereon my taxes does amount

To nothink in the pound.

Some folks looks different on the case, According to their lot,

And thinks about their dwellin'-place Afore their pewter pot;

But since I ain't a seedy clerk

And forced to be genteel,

I views the Budget as a lark,
As cabbies all must feel.

Fashionable Intelligence.

GENERAL HAYNAU has retired awhile to Florence. The softness of its atmosphere, together with the philosophic benevolence of its Duke will, it is expected, soon restore the old soldier. After his recent "let down" in Belgium, it was thought he would have required a more bracing air. It is said, if MR. DISRAELI'S measure of malt be carried, that HAYNAU will visit England: simply because he is assured that the change in the Malt Tax will so improve the condition of the brewers.

PROBLEM FOR MODERN MIRACLE-MONGERS.

GIVEN, CLEOPATRA'S Needle, to hem an Oratorian's long-clothes.

A SWEET LITTLE CREATURE.

TREASURE of extraordinary value was lost, and may have been picked up-by anybody who did not mind touching it-near the Regent's Park, last week. It was advertised in the Timeswith a little elegant circumlocution - in the following terms:

"Strayed from two ladies in the Albert Road, without the Regent's Park, on Saturday evening last, a SMALL FEMALE BLACK and TAN KING CHARLES SPANIEL, long ears and feathered feet, very old and fat, and has some hair off her back from mange. Answers to the name of 'JESSY. Whoever will bring her to &c., may receive Two GUINEAS REWARD." But for the slight indisposition under which this interesting animal was labouring, we might have given a hint towards procuring its restoration, not to say recovery. The likeliest quarter to search for it would have been the Prize Cattle Show, whither it doubtless would have been taken, if it had been in a state of wholesome obesity. It might, perhaps, have been exhibited among the hypertrophied oxenwhom doubtless it would have made to draw in their horns; but a more congenial society for it would have been afforded by the pigs. We fancy we see it panting on its litter, with a memoir posted over its head. The principal particulars of this document, we imagine, would be cream, sugar, pound-cake, mcck-turtle, buns, calfs'-foot jelly, rout cake, and trifle: Feeder, JOHN-whose place we do not envy.

Bucolics at the Antipodes. THE Sydney Morning Herald says

"We fear for our flocks and herds."

No wonder. In Australia, just now, there is no sort of cattle attended to but the Golden Calf.

WE see by the papers that the farmers have, in many places, suffered most severely from the recent inundations. "Great loss of property' is the general report, and in the low lands, especially, there have been high grounds for it. There has, moreover, been a complete bouleversement of the usual routine of farming: and the "four course shift" seems, in many districts, to have been completely shifted. But little seed has yet been sown, for there has been but little land left dry enough to sow it in. And sheep-washing has commenced considerably before its time. Several flocks, we hear, have been already washed clean-away; hurried, like defrauding publicans, to their watery bier.

It is not often we can sympathise with our almost stereotypically "distressed" agriculturists. Their frequent cries of "Wolf!" have somewhat steeled our heart against them. But the present is a case of really "real distress," and as such we offer our sincere condolence. Such excessive wetting must, for a time, have damped their prospects. Still, we trust they will be able to keep their heads above water.

Odd Fellows in Parliament.

A NEW lodge of Odd Fellows has lately been established under the name of the Derby Election Committee. The members of this secret society have been holding their meetings during the past week with closed doors. Their mystical emblem is the Rose; under which flower, in a figurative sense, the proceedings of this sect of Rosycrucians are carried on.

THE BOLD MAN'S BUDGET.-The reduction of the Malt duty to cheapen ale and beer is but a half-and-half measure.

EDUCATION TRADE REPORT.

THE Governess market continues flat. There is a limited demand for full-grown Church-of-Englands, with character and accomplishments. Some inquiry is made for music and French; but the tone of it is low: and the terms offered for the former article resolve themselves into barter, boing a mere song. In some cases, indeed, sales aro attempted to be negotiated for no money at all, or at least for notes which no bank could cash, or by a system of acceptances drawn on paper equally worthless. In proof of the accuracy of these remarks, we subjoin an advertisement from the Times, containing the most extraordinary tenders, and purporting to be issued by a House at Liverpool:

WANTED, as JUNIOR GOVERNESS, in a school of the first respectability,

near Liverpool, a young lady, a member of the Church of England, not under 20 years of age, who has acquired the French language in France, and speaks it with a good accent. She must also be competent to superintend piano practice, to lead a singing class, and to assist in the usual routine of a school-room. No salary given, but lessons in music and drawing from eminent professors, together with laundress, and travelling expenses paid. If the young lady can converse fluently in German, a further remuneration would be given. The strictest inquiry will be made as to character. Apply by letter, post paid, to Beta, Messrs. Deighton and Laughton's, booksellers, Church Street, Liverpool.

Considering the general business in ladies' maids, the steadiness in housekeepers, and the high quotations of good plain cooks, many persons are of opinion that the ridiculously low prices offered for Governesses are merely nominal, and published by designing parties on a bear speculation in order to beat down the market; but whether genuine or fictitious, such shameful proposals deserve the severest reprobation. We incline to think the above announcement a hoax, on account of the allusion to the laundress, whose functious would of course be entirely unknown in a concern so dirty as the Liverpool establishment.

THE STALL. AIR-"Oh, dear, what can the Matter be?".

OH, dear! what beast can fatter be ?
Dear, dear! what beast can fatter be?

Breathing's an awkward affair.

But they Prize me, and buy me a bunch of blue ribbons,

They Prize me, and buy me a bunch of blue ribbons,

To show I've been fed with such care!

THE STY. AIR-" Sing a Song of Sixpence."

SING a song of fattening a pig within his sty,

Until he scarce could wag his tail, and scarce could wink his eye: ] When the butcher killed him, he found no trace of leanWouldn't that for MR. SPRAT a pretty dish have been?

"SER,

་་

A GENTEEL BREACH OF THE PEACE.

BILL COSTERS, tother nite at the Chekers, a readin out the nusepaper for genral Hinformation, come to a count of a row tween a couple o Swells, members of the ouse o commons Edded Fracaw in Parlimant Street. The story was, how one Swell feched another a rap on the back, and E as was It nock'd tuther Swel down and kickt im in the guter. And this here Bisnis the papers calls a Fracaw. Pleze, ser, can you Ixplane wy 'tis a skrimmidge atween swels is called a Fracaw? Sposin BILL COSTERS was to give me a slap in the Chopps an I wos to pitch into im and Punch is ed, twould be spoke of as a Brawl or a Scufle. Hif Fracaw is a Fine Word for Shindy, and sicknifying a Mill amung the soupearior Clarses, preps you'd ave the goodnis to blige your numerus Reeders by telling of us Ow Much Money a cove must be wuth per Hannum in Case of avin ad a Sett Too to ave it call'd a Fracaw? I remane your umbel servent to Come And, &c. "fantail Court, desember 1852. "DICK RUBLEY."

EVERYBODY'S QUESTION.-If LORD PALMERSTON is master of the situation, how is it that the noble Lord is out of Place?