outcome will result from agitation. It seems utterly impossible to
make the officials in charge realise their responsibility to the
taxpayers.

_G.P.O._ Your complaint shall receive consideration.

_G.P._ Of course; the same parrot-cry! And it may be for years, and
it be for ever, before reform is introduced. The probability is, that
the present unsatisfactory condition of affairs may exist at St.
Martin's-le-Grand until the hour of doom.

_G.P.O._ Your complaint shall receive consideration.

* * * * *

REFLECTION BY A GENERAL READER.

I have been reading books wherein 'tis shown
(In diction autocratic, sour, un-civil),
That nothing can be absolutely known,
Save that the Universe is wholly evil!
And even this poor result is only plain
To Genius--which, of course, is quite a rarity.
_I_ should have thought this would have given it pain,
And moved it to both modesty and charity;
But what surprises _me_ (--ZOILUS, to mock sure,
Will whip me with sham-epigrams would-be witty,--)
Is that Agnostics seem so awfully pure,
And Pessimists so destitute of pity.