THE BOTTLE MUST BE BROKEN. 



IN a recent number of The Waterford Mirror, a new species of 

 pensioner has been announced ; it accords precisely with its congeners, 

 in being slimy, creeping, and all but a reptile. It takes a sinecure 

 office when young, and fattens, in time, to such a degree, that it is 

 impossible to dislodge it without destroying its filthy den. The 

 specific variation from the human Do-Nothings, with which it claims 

 to be classed, is, that when cooked it furnishes an agreeable and 

 luscious dish. With the attractions of 800 a-year drawn from the 

 public purse, and her own intrinsic loveliness, Mrs. Arbuthnot, 

 perhaps, well dressed but now for the Waterford Mirror : 



" A few days ago, a boy at Arthburston, county Wexford, on the river of 

 Waterford, perceived something of a very unusual appearance, floundering upon 

 the mud at low water." 



OJ flOIJKOCr TI9(Ip*tCf 



Don't faint, gentle public! This was not the lovely Mrs. 

 Arbuthnot. You pay her 800 a-year, and she was reclining, full of 

 grace and gratitude on a splendid sofa sweet thing ! 



" Upon a nearer approach, the boy found it to be a quart bottle, which 

 showed many symptoms of animation." 



Now, although we admit that there are numerous human quart 

 bottles on the pension-list, which display many symptoms of anima- 

 tion at least about the period of pay day yet they differ widely 

 from the Honourable Mrs. Arbuthnot. To give the beauty her due, 

 she always exhibits symptoms of animation, and has something of an 

 unusual appearance. Few women, perhaps, can match Mrs. Arbuth- 

 not; and certainly no one can rival her among her brother and 

 sister quart-bottles. The male part of the fungi, or acari, are easily dis- 

 tinguishable, by their particularly well-cut coats, with CORKS IN THE 

 NECKS OP THEM. Mrs. Arbuthnot wears a head. But to go back to 

 the boy: 



" He seized the bottle, which was found to contain A LARGE EEL, so much 

 thicker than the bottle neck, that it is supposed the eel must have made its 

 lodgment there when much younger and smaller, and for the purpose of libera-^ 

 ting the fish, it was necessary to break the bottle. The bottle seemed to be 

 a good nursery, for the eel, when cooked, furnished an agreeable and luscious 

 dish." 



So then it turns out, after all, that our bottle was the sinecure, not 

 the sinecurist the office, not the office-holder it had an inhabitant, 

 it was Jilled ; an eel had wriggled into it, and would not come out 

 until it couldn't. Oho ! Then we have committed afaux-pas. The 

 Honourable Mrs. Arbuthnot has been compromised, and we owe her 

 an apology. It seems that while striving to prove that she was not 

 a quart-bottle, floundering in the mud, we ought to have been con- 

 vincing the world that she was not a large eel in the bottle <e so much 

 thicker than the bottle neck," that it might be premised she was 

 much younger and smaller when she made et her lodgement." We 

 confess that this masked battery beats us we admit that Mrs. 

 Arbuthnot was much younger and smaller when she effected her 

 lodgment, and that she is now grown so thick, that it is impossible 

 to expel her THE BOTTLE MUST BE BROKEN ! 

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