WORKS OF HUMOUR.
THE Third Part of GEORGE CRUIKSHANK'S SCRAPS and SKETCHES is highly amusing, and full of drollery, with some good sketches of cha. racter and "points of humour." His shafts "shoot folly as it flies;" and though the game may not always be worth picking up, the artist rarely misses his mark. The scene "Preservation," i. e. a battue of game- keepers and poachers, as well as of pheasants in a preserve, tells better ;hamzs speech Or a pamphlet against the Game-Laws; and his picture of
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"An African Settlement," all the public buildings of which,. barracks, castle, hospital, &c. are represented by tombs, shows the grave to be the "Asylum," not only of "orphans," but of the whole colony. These are the only pieces of political satire ; but there is some good-natured quizzing of society, and abundance of whimsicalities of the artist's own coinage. Here are a whole race of bellows fancies: one patriarchal personage of gigantic altitude and globose dimensions, complains of the wind to a pestle-and-mortar apothecary. "Well, I suppose you come to blow me up," exclaims a little strutting Rumford-stove of a singer, with a kettle- head on its fiery body, to a comical little bellows-headed prig of a musical director, whose nozle is pointed in anger, until the grate singer begins to spout, the bellows puffing his performance : and here are a pair of bellows-like Dutchmen singing "Old rose" to the strains of two other wind instruments. Turn we to another set of sub. jects—The Comfortables "A man with all his little comforts about him," wife, children, cats, dogs, cow, pigs, and poultry ; sure he ought to be happy, and he looks so ; but of all the "comforts," the "di-op of com- fort" is the most delicious ; not the '4 comfort in warm weather" enjoyed by this head, like the stern of a line-of-battle ship floating, hulk-like, on the calm surface of the sea ; nor the "bachelor's comforts" of a foot on each hob, nor "feeling pretty comfortable" after dinner, nor that more than "comfortable nap" in the sunshine of a roaring fire; no, not even the "always comfortable" warm-bath, can vie with the cordial concern with which the sympathizing housewife soothes the watery woes of poor Mrs. Jones, whose grief increases to an eestacy as her fingers touch the glass :—it is gin-wine " Just room for three insides," Sir, says an Ossa of a coachman, with capes like an avalanche, his coach rendered shape. less by the hillocks of flesh and blood that closely stud its roof; while the quadmture of the circle is rendered no longer a problem, by the huge disk entering the door of the vehicle. Well may those lean cattle ex- claim "too bad," and resolve to" kick at it," and snort for their "friend Martin," since these three human hogsheads and "a tun of man" are preparing for the "mensuration of solids " in a coach that carries only " four insides." We have also "Nobody made fun of" in these sketches; so that nobody will object, and every body will buy them. The burletta of "Torn Thumb," with designs by GEORGE Cnurtz- SHANK, adds another group of fun to his gallery of comicalities. The
horse-marine Amazon Glumdalca is prodigiously droll ; she is a compound of scullion,fish-wife, and basket-woman—Abraharnides in petticoats ; her look and attitude in the frontispiece are inimitable.' The King and Queen,Grizzle and Huncamunca, are not so good—they want character ; and the Thumb-hero is only droll by virtue of his littleness. The designs nevertheless are rich and well cut.
" The Mayor of Garratt" is an attempt to interfere with this popular series of stage drolleries. The designs, by R. S EY MO UR, are not without merit, but compared with GEORGE Cal:II:SHANK, are as Buckstone to Liston. The letterpress illustrations of this rich farce are curious.
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