_Early Visitor._ "WHY, WHAT ON EARTH ARE YOU DOING, MATHILDE,--TURNING
YOUR BOUDOIR INTO A POULTRY YARD?"

_Mathilde._ "WELL, MY DEAR, AS IT IS IMPOSSIBLE TO RELY ON GETTING
NEW-LAID EGGS IN TOWN, I HAVE HAD MY PET COCHIN-CHINA UP FROM THE
COUNTRY, AND SHE IS THOROUGHLY TO BE TRUSTED!"]

* * * * *

CORIOLANUS.

"I would he had continu'd to his country
As he began, and not unknit, himself,
The noble knot he made."

_Coriolanus_, Act IV., Scene 2.

"His Majesty discriminates between the Prince BISMARCK of former
times, and of to-day, and is anxious that his Government should avoid
everything which might tend to diminish, in the eyes of the German
nation, the familiar figure of its greatest Statesman."--_Instructions
to Imperial German Representatives abroad:_--

Can this be he who "At the Gates"[1]
Of Janus' Temple stood of old,
Protective, vigilant, and bold,
As one who calmly dares--and waits?

"_So fancy limns him, who'll not cease