THE man who cannot sympathize with a wheelwright in his joys and sorrows ought to be treated to a taste of lynch (or lynch-pin) law. No one with a properly regulated mind can fail to admire their round-about way of doing things, and their untiring energy; and no rightly thinking person could be otherwise than rejoiced on hearing the other day that these jolly good felleys had made up their minds to have a trundle down the harbour, and an afternoon's enjoyment Of course the party started from the Circular Quay, and took with them a plentiful supply of weal and ham pies and roly-poly puddings. They reached their destination in safety, and after a short walk along the beach, the order was given to "right-wheel," and they found themselves in a delightful glade, where the blue gum waved its giant branches in the summer air, and the luxuriant axel-tree cast a grateful shade over the holiday-keepers.

The ladies—with complexions of a smoothness only to be attained by sand-paper in experienced hands—looked as fresh as paint, and shone like varnish. They were at tired, in elegant and becoming costumes. Spokes was nearly missing the affair altogether, as he woke late, and then had to dress, wash, and (spoke)-shave himself in a hurry. Old Wheels—and a wideawake old fly-wheel he was—drove down in his buggy with Mrs. Wheels and the four Miss Wheels, and, what with the front and hind wheels of the trap, the wheals inflicted by the avenging hand of Old Wheels on the horse's behind, and the young Wheels—segments of the parent Wheels—clinging on wherever they could get hand or foot-hold, it was estimated that there couldn't have been less than sixty or seventy wheels to the turn-out. Talking of traps, the four Miss Wheels constituted a four-wheeled trap for the hearts of men of a most dangerous description; and, after they had all partaken plentifully of the weal pies, there was weal within Wheels, and a complicated state of things which set mathematical and digestive theories at defiance.

Old Wheels delivered an address, in which he stated that a bond of unity was the best tire for the public weal, and that if the felleys in the House wern't such a lot of (k)naves, they'd run truer, stick closer together, and endeavour to axelerate public business more than they did. He was proceeding to demonstrate that ——— was no more use in the House than the "fifth wheel of a coach," when one of the younger Wheels began to squeak in an agonizing manner. It was immediately greased with some strawberrys and cream, and its (s)creams subsided into chuckles of gratification. Dancing, of the "turnabout, and wheel-about, and jump Jim Crow" order, then commenced, and kiss-in-the-ring, rounders, and other circular amusements, became general. A musical young wheelwright, on being called on for a song, suspended his occupation of picking his teeth with a lynch-pin, and gave them "Weel may the keel row," and Axelcior." Spokes proved himself a capital speaker, and made the speech of the day, full of beautifully rounded sentences and quotations from Spokeshave. But all things must have an end unfortunately, and when at length the whistle of the steam-boat sounded for departure, the wheelwrights took their way homeward, happy, but thoroughly tired.