1/0 The Newspaper Office. [FEB. 



the corporation have some thoughts of inserting the stranger gent, in the 

 stocks, by way of satisfaction for their disappointment. Should I hear 

 further on this important subject I will not fail to let you know. 

 Arislides." (Opens a third letter and reads.) " Mister Edditur, Zur. 

 Yourself and your house and all as is in it will be blowed up this here 

 night. Swing." Concise, and gentlemanlike, and singularly gramma- 

 tical. But 'egad, I have no time for complimenting. 



Enter Mr. O'FLAM, an Irish Reporter. 



O'FLAM. Have I the honor to address the Editor ? 



EDITOR. Excuse me, Sir, but I am very busy just at 



O'FLAM. Exactly so. I will not detain you a moment. My name, 

 Sir, is Dennis O'Flam they call me Dionysius for short and I have 

 but lately arrived in London, where being desirous of bettering my con- 

 dition, I have excuse my abruptness advertised for a wife in your 

 estimable journal. Matrimony, they say, is a cold bath, but perhaps I 

 may find it less chilly than I had expected. 



EDITOR. Oh ! never fear ; you will be soon enough in hot water. 

 Under what signature did you advertise ? 



O'FLAM. Hercules Broadset, and moreover requested the favour of an 

 interview with whomsoever should answer the advertisement, in a 

 private room at the office, which your clerk, in consideration of one or 

 two reports w r hich I had furnished gratis for the paper, was considerate 

 enough to offer me. 



EDITOR. Hercules Broadset ! a very attractive compound. 



O'FLAM. Attractive, Sir ! 'tis resistless. Consider what a fine athletic 

 fellow Hercules was a hero with the lungs of a lion, and the shoulders 

 of an elephant, who by dint of mere muscle actually strangled a man 

 with three heads ! Ah, Sir, times are changed since then. So far from 

 meeting a man with three heads now a days, if you meet three men with 

 one head between them, 'tis as much as you can expect. 



EDITOR. Have you received any replies to your advertisement? 



O'FLAM. Dozens, Sir. But have modestly contented myself with two, 

 " a pensive virgin" and " a disconsolate widow." An instinctive bene- 

 volence inclines me to the unfortunate, and accordingly I have appointed 

 to meet them here this day, one at two o'clock, and the other at the half- 

 hour. Till then, adieu ! [Exit O'FLAM. 



Enter JOB ALLWORK, a Reporter of Accidents, fyc. 



JOB. Oh, Sir ! such a fire ! quite a gem ! Scampered off to give you 

 the very first intelligence, and nearly broke my neck in 



EDITOR. Halt, friend ! that is the hangman's business. 



JOB. Don't mention it ; you make me nervous. 



EDITOR. To the point, Sir, if you please. 



JOB. Why you see, Sir, it appears that last night the apprentice of 

 old Mr. Dobbs, pawnbroker in Newport-street who, I should premise, 

 has got a trick of reading in bed happened, strangely enough, to fall 

 asleep over a volume of poems. 



EDITOR. There is nothing strange in that ; but proceed. 



JOB. While locked in the arms of Morpheus, the flame of the 

 bed-candlestick, somehow or other, caught hold of the young man's red 

 cotton night-cap ; and after singeing him, like Mr. St. John Long, made 

 all possible haste to communicate its ardour to the bed-curtains. Thus 



