_) All right, POLLY, they've _begun_--I can see the 'ero's legs!
_Polly_. Be quiet, can't you? I can't hold the tubes steady if you
will keep making me laugh so. (_Listening._) Oh, ALF, I can hear
singing--can't you? Isn't it lovely!
_The Com. M._ It seems to me there's a bluebottle, or something, got
inside mine--I can 'ear _im_!
_The Irr. P._ (_angrily, to himself_). How the deuce do they
expect--and that infernal organ in the nave has just started booming
again--they ought to send out and stop it!
_The Chatty O.G._ (_touching his elbow_). I beg your pardon, Sir, but
can you inform me what opera it is they're performing at Manchester?
The _Prima Donna_ seems to be just finishing a song. Wonderful how one
can hear it all!
_The Irr. P._ (_snapping_). Very wonderful indeed, under the
circumstances! (_He corks both ears with the tubes_). It's too
bad--now there's a confounded string-band beginning outs--(_Removes
the tube._) Eh, what? (_More angrily than ever._) Why, it's _in_ the
blanked thing! (_He fumbles with the tubes in trying to readjust them.
At last he succeeds, and, after listening intently, is rewarded by
hearing a muffled and ghostly voice, apparently from the bowels of the
earth, say_--"Ha, say you so? Then am I indeed the hooshiest hearsher
in the whole of Mumble-land!")
_The Chatty O.
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