[The next poem was written for "The Forget-Me-Not" for this year, to accompany a picture by J. Knight.]

THE PAINTER PUZZLED.

"Draw, Sir !"-Old Play.

WELL, Something must be done for May,
The time is drawing nigh,

To figure in the catalogue

And woo the public eye.

Something I must invent and paint ;
But, oh my wit is not

Like one of those kind substantives
That answer Who and What?

Oh, for some happy hit to throw
The gazer in a trance:
But posé là-there I am posed,
As people say in France.

In vain I sit and strive to think,
I find my head, alack!
Painfully empty, still, just like
A bottle " on the rack."

In vain I task my barren brain
Some new idea to catch,
And tease my hair-ideas are shy
Of "coming to the scratch."

In vain I stare upon the air,
No mental visions dawn;
A blank my canvas still remains,
And worse-a blank undrawn :

An "aching void" that mars my rest
With one eternal hint,

For, like the little goblin page,
It still keeps crying "Tint!"

But what to tint? ay, there's the rub,
That plagues me all the while,
As, Selkirk-like, I sit without
A subject for my ile.

"Invention's seventh heaven" the bard Has written-but my case

Persuades me that the creature dwells

In quite another place.

Sniffing the lamp, the ancients thought

Demosthenes must toil;

But works of art are works indeed,
And always "smell of oil."

Yet painting pictures, some folks think,

Is merely play and fun ;

That what is on an easel set

Must easily be done.

But, zounds! if they could sit in this

Uneasy easy-chair,

They'd very soon be glad enough

To cut the Camel's hair.

Oh! who can tell the pang it is
To sit as I this day-

With all my canvas spread, and yet
Without an inch of way.

Till, mad at last to find I am
Amongst such empty skullers,

I feel that I could strike myself
But no-I'll" strike my colours."

[The succeeding Address to Mr. Wrench, like the one to Gibbon Wakefield, exists in my possession as a newspaper cutting. It might have been extracted from some other source by the Editor-but I have been unable to trace it.]

TO MR. WRENCH AT THE ENGLISH OPERA HOUSE.*

Oh very pleasant Mr. Wrench,

The first, upon the pit's first bench,
I've scrambled to my place,

To hail thee on these summer boards
With joy, even critic-craft affords,
And watch thy welcome face!

Ere thou art come, how I rejoice
To hear thy free and easy voice,

Lounging about the slips;

And then thy figure comes and owns
The voice as careless as the tones

That saunter from thy lips.

* The Adelphi.

VOL. VI.

14

Oh come and cast a quiet glance,

To glad a nameless friend, askance
The lamps' ascending glare;
Better it is than bended knees,

Heart-squeezing, and profound congés
That old familiar air.

Even in the street, in that apt face,
Full of gay gravity, I trace

The soul of native whim;

A constant, never-failing store

Of quiet mirth, that ne'er runs o'er,
But ay is near the brim.

Quoth I, "There goes a happy wight,
Inimical to spleen and spite,

And careless of all care;

Who oils the ruffled waves of strife,
And makes the work-day suit of life
Of very easy wear.

Lord! if he had some people's ills

To cope their hungry bonds and bills,

How faintly they would tease;

Things that have cost both tears and sighsTheir foes, as motelings in his eyes

Their duns, his summer fleas !

The stage, I guess, is not thy school

Thou dost not antic like the fool
That wept behind his mask;

Thy playing is thy play—a sport—
A revel, as perform'd at Court,
And not a trade-a task!

Gay Freeman, art thou hired for him?
No-'tis thy humour and thy whim

To be that easy guest;

Whereas whoever plays for pelf,

(Like Bennett) only gives him-self,

Or her-like Mrs. West!

Nay, thou-to look beyond the stage,
Thy life is but another page

Continued of the play;

The same companionable sprite

Thy whim and pleasantry by night

Are with thee in the day!

[This year's announcement of "The Comic" appeared in "The Athenæum" in November.]

ADDRESS.

THE public in general, and the Livery of London in particular, are respectfully informed that, in spite of Sir Peter Laurie, the "Comic Annual," like the Lord Mayor, intends to come forward for "one cheer more."

It will appear in the same month with the new Chief Magistrate; and the usual quantity of prose and verse, with a new service of plates, are in active preparation for the occasion.

Having twice served its office before, there is little necessity for any declaration of its unpolitical principles ;-but its studious aim being to be "open to all parties," it pledges itself to attend impartially (for 12s.) to any requisition that may be addressed to Mr. Tilt, Fleet Street, modestly sug