... : n - -. ?? S.. I A DRY FEBRUARY NINE years out of ten February is rather a wet month. On the average of the half-century July is our wettest month in England, then October, and then February, which, being succeeded by four comparatively dry months, is the period when timely rainfall is of most importance to agriculture. The drought of the present February has been greater than in the same ...

... Tht gpotanbtr Stand by.-CAPTAIX CUTTLE BY J. ASHBY-STERRY SAID dear old Mrs. Gamp, What a blessed thing it is to make sick people happy in their beds, and never mind about oneself as long as one can do a service. The invalids attended by the immortal Sairey probably had their own ideas about being mane happy in their beds, and might certainly argue that, at any rate, as far as pickled ...

... ' ot jaipaiv'- BY CHRISTOPHER DRESSER UNDER the somewhat singular title of The , we have another book added to the already long list of works written mn a country which is full of interest, and about the peopleofwhich, t'.e customs, the architecture, the handicrafts, and a hundred other things we are always glad to learn. Some will think that the pleasantly-wrivtten work of Mr. Henry Norman ...

... VIC VP!talbcv Shadzl 1y.'-CflAI4N C:JTTLZ BY J. ASIIBY-STERRY SPEAtrNGxofClement'sInn and Albert Smith the other week, I ough'it to have mentioned that the very best description of the quaint oil place and its surroundings-as it existed years agone-may be foun I in the aforesaid author's novel, Christopher Tadpole. Ile minutely describes the flall, now in course of demolition, with its ...

... JEAN LAON G.'RO'VE VERY few of the living French artists of long-established repilta- tion have done better work than M. Gdrdme. He was a pupil of Paul Delaroche, and the influence of that master is clearly to be seen in many of his early works. That he made rapid progress is evident from the fact that a medal was awarded to a picture that he exhibited at the Salon in i847, when he was only ...

... ;z z ;4 on I z c) C? ?4 D 0 z W ?34 P2 71 0 d O, d - a : bt - C =J bl c-C a ° ...

... free jilbrafics To some extent the frequenters of the Free Library differ with the library's locality, though one variety of patron is with them all -the loafer. He is one of the pests of the Free Library, and more difficult to be rid of than the thumb-mark. At the Guildhall Library, which is largely a reference library, he haunted the- newspaper-room, not caring greatly for the news- papers, ...

... brow THE POLITICAL SITUATION.-It is always ominous when the man in the street asks, Is the Government breaking up ? That question has been a good deal heard in political circles during the last few days, and although Gladstonites scoff at the idea, there is unquestionably a certain degree of uncomfortableness among them. Nor did this sense of a bad time coming lessen when Mr. Gladstone used ...

... D)orme Auto IMPENDING BN-ELECTrONS AT last, after a long spell without a single change in the House of Commons, there is a promise of one or two by-elections. The elevation of Sir Hussey Vivian to the Peerage will create a vacancy in the Swansea District, and the resignation of Mr. Peter McLagan will bring about a contest at Linlithgow. This latter seat the Unionists have some hope of gaining, ...

... ?? rlp?? of ffi i 00I ?? I PRESIDENT HARRISON'S WAR SCARE.-President Harrison tried hard for some days to convey the impression that a serious difficulty had arisen between Great Britain and the United States. Happily, his efforts were not successful. In both countries sensible men refused to believe that there could be anything like a quarrel about a matter which the two peoples desired to ...

... M. CLEMENCEAU Leader of the French Radic,;s Mf. PAUL DAROUI.E)E Poet and Boulangist DR. CORNELIUS IHERTZ. Financier and Scientist M. ANDRIEUX The Ex-Prefect of 'Police Tul [).C valiallia . ?ivlll.W5 OF the four public men mixed up, in the Panama business whose portraits we give MiM. Clemenceau and DNrou- lede were the, two fire- eaters who fought a bloodless duel with pistols last week. M. ...

... Vaal V3otes THE HARVEST FEW things connected *with at, culture are more curious thanljit combination of an nelae:wi, . conservatism with an ii capacity for advance. (to inventions, such as the ha'' machine and the ensilage f were not unknown in as recognisable form in classi,[i 1ilo: yet we read that, in t7I, a De Lille, who ventured in ic' : weather' to cut his wheat expedition with a ...