POOR CONSOLATION.-A clergyman said that he once visited a lady of his parish who had just lost her husband, in order to offer her consolation, and upon her earnest inquiries as to the reunion of families in heaven, he strongly asserted his belief in that fact. When she asked with anxiety whether any time must elapse before friends would be able to find each other in the next world, he emphatically said, "No, they will be united at once." He was thinking of the happiness of being able to offer the relief of such a faith, when she broke in upon his meditations by exclaiming sadly, "Well, his first wife has got him again, then, by this time."

PERPETUAL MOTION.-A dog's tail. PERPETUAL COMMOTION.-A scold's tongue.

Mrs. Brown to Mrs. Jones: "Dear Mary, please lend me your best black bonnet, and black shawl with the crape trimmings, and let them be sent smart, as I'm going up town and must look respectable. "P.S.-John's just dead." John was her husband.

In some American hotels the lady who has had the greatest number of husbands walks out first; a novice who has only had one husband is "small potatoes."

ANSWERS TO ENIGMAS.

I.-To-morrow.

II.-A wafer.

III. The letter R.

IV. A newspaper.

V. An umbrella.

VI. The first letter of each line gives the answer.
VII.-A ring.

VIII.-Read down from the first word, and then up;

and the riddle will become apparent.

THE NEW YORK PUBLIC LIBRARY

ASTOR. LENOX TILDEN FOUNDATIONS

THE

VICTORIA

MAGAZINE.

JANUARY, 1879.

REASONLESS-REALISM.

R

EASON has fled-within the clouded brain
There is a void; within the soulless eyes
A vacancy, and at her heart a pain

That finds relief in silence and in sighs.

A fair wreck, truly! Fragile form and face

That many men have praisèd; with a mind,

Which wove and wrought strange fancies with true grace
Of poetry and passion, worldly blind.

Ah, trustful clinging child! Heaven's heavy rain
Beat on thy head too harshly; you were born
To bask in sunshine; yet you watched in vain
Through life's dark storm to hail the light of dawn.

Dawn for the doubter! Dawn for those who weep
In mist-clad night time! Aye, there must arise
The light to guide us. Sometime up earth's steep
The sun will climb and flood our clouded skies.

P

We shall be wise--and wisdom making pure
Shall be our blessing and our benefit-
True love shall light us; charity allure.

And bonds of brotherhood be firmer knit.

And she, our darling, when those good days come
(She who to regions reasonless hath fled)
Shall be no longer blind to truth, and dumb
To those who love her, soulless as the dead.

Life shall be real to her in sunny climes,

Where those who have been lost to earthly life Shall realise long dreamt-of halcyon times, And reap the joy with which high heaven is rife.

The reasonless shall realise! Alas!

And are we not all lacking reason? So
The veil shall be uplifted; we shall pass
Into the light of truth that God will show.

LEONARD LLOYD.