The Sun.
London, England, 1863-11-27 00:00:00

Enter a Girlish Young Lady, whom we'll call Ellen,

Ellen (with feeble passion)—Mary I
Mary (emotionally affectionate)—Ellen I Sister I
they embrace three times.

Arthur (aside)-- She knows who was down stairs. (Aloud
and bashfully)—As it's your birthday, Mary, I've brought
you this.
(" This" appeared from where we were sitting to be a
small cabbage leaf, but as Mary called it violets on the spot,
we suppose she was right.)
Mary (rapturously)-01a, Arthur I
[Shakes his hands heartily.
Ellen—And I've brought you this. (We forget what.)

Mary (more rapturously and sobbing)—Oh, Ellen I
[Embraces her several times.
Enter a Little Boy about nine years old, whom we will call

Jimmy.
Jimmy (squeaking)—l've brought you some Vi-lets,
be-cos Sister loves Vi-lets.
[Finishes in a very high key.
Mary (ecstatically)—Real Violets. (The others weren't
then 1?)—Oh
[She embraces Jimmy, who stands with his hands in
his pockets. Then crosses and embraces Ellen, who
embraces Mary, who shakes hands with Arthur,
who pats Jimmy's head.
Arthur (suddenly)—Let's hide I [They all get behind
tables and chairs.]
Enter Uncle Baby, played by Mr. Widdicomb._

Uncle Baby (in a wandering manner)—I met a friend,
and I said, there's my Mary at home. [They all come out
of their hiding-places.]
Mary—Oh, you dear Uncle Baby.
[Embraces him, he embraces Mary, she embraces Ellen,
Ellen hugs Uncle Baby, Uncle Baby hugs Eden and
Nary, Arthur shakes hands with Jimmy, and then
the business of the scene continues.]

(Ellen begins telling her secret, supposed to be only in-
tended for her sister's ear, either ear of course, probably
the one farthest from the audience.)
Gentleman in Pit—Speak up I
Gentleman in Boxes (angrily)—But l've got number 48,
boxkeeper, and this is the third time that—
Everybody (in every part)—lisssasssassssssh I
Enter an aimless young man, played by Mr. F. Charles,
let us call him Dumpkins.

Mary (politely)—Mr. bumpkins—my sister—Ellen—my
sister Ellen. _

Dumpkins (jumping a good two feet from Mary by way
of indicating a start, aside)—Ha I
Ellen (giving a little cry)—A---(it doesn't get to "h.")
Mary (cleverly)—You've met before.
Uncle Baby (who knows nothing about it)—They've met
before,

Arthur (who has not said anything for some time)—l
know what's down-stairs. (Goes to fetch it whatever it is).
Mary (severely)—l understand it all.
Gentlemen in Pit (loudly)—That's more than we do.
[Exeunt everybody except Mary and Ellen, who being
alone, embrace one another in the right hand
corner of the stage,

Mary (sweetly)—Ellen I
(Ellen is supposed to say " Mary," as perhaps she does.
Anyhow they walk to the left-hand corner and embrace
again by way of novelty. Ellen tells her long and melan-
choly history, during which the following observations are
made by the deeply interested audience.)
Indignant Paterfamilias (in Dress Circle)—Look here,
boakeeper. Where's 48 ? I've been put into—
A. Voice (close at hand)—A passion.
[Paterfamilias turns, but owner of voice remains
undiscovered.]
Paterfamilias—l've been in 97 and 84—
Somebody —'B4l Good vintage.
[Remains undiscovered.
Boakeeper—Let me see your tickets.
Lovers of Order—Hassssimissssssh I
Paterfamilias—l've given you my tickets. I've got none
now.

.Boakeeper—Well, Sir, if you've got no tickets you must
go out.
Paterfamilias—But I've paid, I tell you, and I've given
you—
__

Lover of Order— Hush, Hush, Hush!
[Exit Patetfamilas with Boxkeeper, and they are heard
having it out in the lobby. In the meantime Ellen
has told her story, and Mary has embraced her and
appealed to the picture of her mother over the door;
Uncle Baby enters intoxicated.
Uncle Baby—Mary, lendmertenpounds I
Mary (opens desk)—My earnings—
Ellen—Oh, Uncle I [Embraces Mary.
[Exit Uncle Baby, and enter aimless Dumpkins,
Jimmy, and Arthur.
Dumpkins—Oh, Ellen I [Takes her hand.
Arthur (bashfully)—lf she only knew what was down
stairs.
Enter Uncle Baby, sober.
(Uncle Baby—l've seen him and sold the annuity, and
got permission for you all to be married. Take her—bless
you—be happy ;—and if our friends in front will only join,
then there will not sit down a happier party to supper than'
Uncle Baby.)
Curtain descents.
This piece, turned into a very pretty ballet, with costumes
a la JVatteau, and sparkling music by Mr. W. H. Mont-
gomery, would open the evening very well ; but who that
knows how to give a good entertainment will dose his
guests with a glass of sixth-rate Chablis with his oysters,
simply because the remainder of the dinner is to be washed
down with the very best sparkling Meet and Chaudon
No, no, Mr. Fechter, Bel Demonio will suffice for every-
body, and begin at eight by all means ; but if there must
be a comedietta, by way et first course, then let it be some-
thing better of its kind than Uncle Baby.

An absurd effect was produced one night last
week at Marseilles, where they were playing the
"Huguenots." When the soldiers tried to fire on Marcel,
Valentine, and Raoul, in the last act, it was found that the
powder had not been put into their muskets ; naturally the
caps alone exploded ; but this did not prevent Valentine
and Raoul falling down dead, amidst the roars of the au-
dience. Marcel, an older soldier, stood up like a man till
a scene-shifter took a shot at him from the slips, when he
fell over the bodies of his prematurely deceased friends, and
the curtain fell upon the group .
A GREAT GARDENER'S FIRST ATTEMPT.—I will
relate an anecdote of the great Thomas Andrew
Knight, who, when a child, on seeing the gardener one day
planting beans in the grounds, asked him why he buried
those bits of wood, and was told that they would grow into
bean plants, and bear beans. He watched the event, and'
finding that it happened as the gardener had foretold, deter-
mined to plant his pocket-knife, in the expectation of its
also growing, and bearing other knives; and when be caw
that that did not take place, he set himself to consider the
'
cause of the difference in the twe cases, and thus was led to
occupy his earliest thoughts with those attempts at tracing
the vital phenomena of plants to their causes, and upon
which he eventually constructed so brilliant a reputation,
for a greater vegetable physiologist never lived than the
late Mr. Knight, ffibberd' s Gar-
of Downton Castle.—
Gar-
dener's er' s Magazine.
GIANT PREDECESSORS OF LE GEANT.—
Of former
ballons with which a comparison may be made We
have first Egg's Folly, a gigantic balloon built of skins, and
in form like a fish, having internally a small gas bladder,
and this appendage even Was of dimensions sufficient
to take up, in after years, when the fish balloon itself was
no more, Barnum's Tom Thumb at the Surrey Gardens.
The Globe, a French balloon, which ascended from Cro.
morn° in 1852, would take up five-and-twenty persons, and
was, we believe, fully as large as the Geant.
Then, again,
Heare's immense fire balloon, which played such sad antics
at the Beulah Spa—starting off without due notice of its
intentions, and carrying off in its netting some of the poor
workmen, to land them with broken bones. Indeed, the
vagaries of this monster brought it to au untimely end, for,
refusing to go up on another occasion at the Surrey Gardens,
it was cut to pieces with halfpence shied by the infuriated
multitude. Lowe's aerial ship in America, which was built
to cross the Atlantic sonic three years since, was double the
I size of the Gout.