But I have over-stated my case: there have been some complaints from parties not publicans after all. On looking through a file of the Daily News for the last three months I find three such. No. 1, is there placed in the largest type, and headed, “Starvation by Act of Parliament!” You are alarmed. Read on, your fears will soon cease. The writer says: – “Sir, I am a bachelor living in chambers, the resources of my ménage do not extend to cooking a dinner, and, like most persons in my situation, I generally dine at a tavern in the neighbourhood. On Sunday, I attended the afternoon service at Saint Paul’s Cathedral, and upon my return at five o’clock (what a circumstantial dog he is!) I repaired with my appetite in excellent condition to my usual dining-place in Fleet-street. I was rather taken aback at finding a closed door frowning upon me; but I rang the bell, and, after a brief delay, a small part of the door was cautiously opened, and there appeared in the apeture the head of a disconsolate looking waiter, who told me that the establishment was closed in compliance with the provision of the New Beer Bill, and that consequently I could not have any dinner.” The next deep pang of anguish bursts from the bleeding bosom of a Templar, who says: – “I am a victim of this Act, being scarcely able to get any dinner before the Sunday evening service.” Another, a father of a family, says he dines at five, and he finds the beer flat. That I imagine is his own fault. Surely it was not the Act of Parliament did that. We shall next be told when the beer turns sour that was also the Act of Parliament. But perhaps I am wrong. A well-known judge declared Parliament could do every thing but make a woman a man or a man a woman. So, after all, the father of a family may be right, and the New Beer Bill may be the reason why his “arf-and-arf” is flat.