Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 103, September 10, 1892 by Various
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Various >> Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 103, September 10, 1892
Or seek the uplands, where of old Bo Peep
(So runs the tale) lost all her fleecy flocks;
There happy shepherds tend their grazing sheep
(Some men like mutton, some prefer the ox).
Ay, surely it would need a heart of flint
To watch the blithe lambs caper o'er the lea,
And, watching them, refrain from thoughts of mint,
Of new potatoes, and the sweet green pea.
Is Lunch worth lunching? The September sun
Makes answer "Yes;" no longer must thou lag.
Forth to the stubble, cynic; take thy gun,
And add the juicy partridge to thy bag.
Out in the fields the keen-eyed pigeons coo;
They fill their crops, and then away they fly.
Pigeons are sometimes passable in stew,
And always quite delicious in a pie.
Or pluck red-currants on some summer day,
Then take of raspberries an equal part,
Add cream and sugar--can mere words convey
The luscious joys of this delightful tart?
Is Lunch worth lunching? If such cates should fail,
Go out of country bread a solid hunch,
Pile on it cheese, wash down with country ale,
And, faring plainly, yet enjoy thy lunch.
Yea, this is truth, the lunch of knife and fork,
The pic-nic lunch, spread out upon the earth,
Lunches of beef, bread, mutton, veal, or pork,
All, all, without exception all, are worth!
* * * * *
NINETY-NINE OUT OF A HUNDRED CANDIDATES MUST BE "PILLED."--The Living
of "Easington-with-Liverton, Yorkshire, worth L600 per annum," is
vacant. Is it in the gift of the celebrated Dr. COCKLE? or of Dr.
CARTER, of Little-Liverpill-Street fame?
* * * * *
[Illustration: "BACK!"]
* * * * *
PLAYFUL HEIFERVESCENCE AT HAWARDEN.
[Mr. GLADSTONE met with an extraordinary adventure in Hawarden
Park one day last week. A heifer, which had got loose, made
for Mr. GLADSTONE as he was crossing the park, and knocked
him down. Mr. GLADSTONE took refuge behind a tree. The heifer
scampered off, and was subsequently shot.]
[Illustration]
G.O.M. _sings_:--
How happy could I be with heifer,
If sure it were only her play.
Is't LABBY? or Labour? Together
In one? I'll get out of the way.
_Singing_ (_to myself_)--With my tol de rol de rol LABBY, &c.
She comes! On her horns she is playing
A tune with a nourish or two!
No cow-herd am I but my staying
To play second fiddle won't do.
_Singing_ (_to myself_)--With my tol de rol tol-e-rate LABBY, &c.
Don't chivey her! I would allot her
"Three acres," and lots of sweet hay.
Alas! while I'm talking, they've shot her!
Well! heifers, like dogs, have their day!
_Singing_ (_to myself, as before_)--With my tol lol de rol-licking
LABBY, &c.
_Latest._--After dinner, Mr. GLADSTONE fell asleep in his chair! He
was seen to smile, although his repose seemed somewhat disturbed.
Presently he was heard to murmur melodiously the words of the old
song, slightly adapted to the most recent event,--"_Heifer of thee
I'm fondly dreaming_!" Then a shudder ran through his frame as he
pronounced softly a Latin sentence; it was "_Labor omnia vincit_!"
Then he awoke.
* * * * *
SONGS OUT OF SEASON.
NO. II.--KEW-RIOUS!
It's a pleasure worth the danger,
Deems your gorgeous DE LA PLUCHE,
To become the main arranger
Of a drive in your barouche;
And your Coachman, honest JOE too,
When approached thereon by JEAMES,
Doesn't say exactly "no," to
Such inviting little schemes.
JEAMES has doffed them "'orrid knee-things;"
Plush gives way to tweed and socks;
And a hamper with the tea-things,
Fills his place upon the box;
With MARIA, JANE, and HEMMA,
He is playing archest games,
And they're in the sweet dilemma,
Who shall make the most of JAMES.
Mr. COACHMAN smokes his pipe on
His accustomed throne of pride,
And, through driving, keeps an eye 'pon
All the revellers inside.
Mrs. COACHMAN there is seated;
Children twain are on her lapped,
Who alternately are treated,
And alternately are slapped.
While the painters haunt your mansion,
And you're "_H_up" "The _H_alps" or "Rhind,"
Your domestics find expansion
In diversions of the kind;
And on such a day as this is,
They will drink the health at Kew,
Of "The Master and the Missis,
And their bloomin' kerridge too!"
* * * * *
THE PALLIUM AND ARCHIEPISCOPAL OATH CONTROVERSY IN THE "TIMES."--No
wonder this is a very dry subject, when they've got such a strong
THURST-ON among them. Our advice, by way of moistening it, is, "Drop
it!"
* * * * *
"CLERGY FEES" (_see "Times" Correspondence_).--_Growl of the
Archiepiscopal Ogre & Co._:--
"_Fee_, fi, fo, fum!
I smell the coin of a Clergyman!
Hath he fat glebe, be he ill-fee'd, ill-fed,
I'll grab his fees to butter my bread!"
* * * * *
A NIGHTLY CHEVALIER.
Music-Hall Artists are not by any means "Fixed Stars." During the
evening they manage to accomplish the somewhat paradoxical-sounding
feat of shining in the same parts, yet in different places and at
different times, appearing everywhere with undiminished brilliancy.
The Student of the Music-Hall Planetary system, has only by
observation to ascertain the exact time and place of the appearance of
his favourite bright particular Star, and then to pay his money, take
his choice between sitting and standing, and like a true astronomer,
he will--glass in hand, a strong glass too,--await the great event of
the evening, calmly and contentedly.
If the Wirtuous Westender wandering down the Strand, after having
on some previous nights exhausted the Pavilion and the elaborately
gorgeous Variety Shows given at the Empire and Alhambra, seeks for
awhile a resting-place wherein to enjoy his postprandial cigar, and be
amused, if such an one will drop into the classic Tivoli, he will find
excellent entertainment, that is as long as their present programme
holds the field. The Holborn and the Oxford may delight him on other
nights, for it seems that much the same Stars shine all around; but
for the present, taking Tivoli as synonymous with Tibur, he may, with
Horation humour, say to himself ("himself" being not a bad audience as
a rule):--
"Holborn Tibur amem ventosus, Tivoli Holborn,"
and he can then enter the Tivoli, now under the benign rule of that
old Music Hall Hand, CAROLUS MORTONIUS, M.A., Magister Agens, while
the experienced Mr. VERNON DOWSETT--"_Experientia Dowsett_"--manages
the stage. Good as is the entire show, and especially good as is
the performance of Mr. CHARLES GODFREY as an old Chelsea Pensioner
recounting to several little Peterkins a touching and heart-stirring
tale of the Crimean War, yet for me, the Costermonger Songs of
Mr. ALBERT CHEVALIER are the great attraction. His now well-known
"_Coster's Serenade_," and his "_Knocked 'em in the Old Kent Road_,"
are supplemented by a song and dialogue about a Coster's son, a
precocious little chap, about three years old, and "only that 'igh,
you know," in whom his father takes so great a pride that it works
his own temporary reformation. It is so natural as to be just on
the borderland between farce and pathos, and recalls time past, when
ROBSON played _The Porter's Knot_, and such-like pieces. Now what more
do Music Halls want than what Mr. CHEVALIER gives them? This is the
very essence of a dramatic sketch of character, given in just the
time it takes to sing the song,--that is, about ten minutes, if as
much. The compact orchestra, under the directorship of Mr. ASHER,
discourses excellent accompaniments, and the music of the CHEVALIER's
songs--composed, I believe, by himself--is not the least among the
attractions. The CHEVALIER, who, as he takes more than one turn every
evening, may be termed a Knight Errant, is certainly the Coster's
Laureate and accepted Representative in the West; the mine, which is
his own, is inexhaustible. He is a magician in his own peculiar line,
and may write himself ALBERTUS MAGNUS.
* * * * *
"AL FRESCO," the Lightning Artist, whose full name is "ALFRED FRESCO,"
writes to suggest that the Alhambra under Mr. JOHN HOLLINGSHEAD's
management should start a Rotten Row Galop and Kensington Gardens
Quadrille to follow as in a series the highly successful _Serpentine
Dance_.
* * * * *
NOVEL QUARTETTE.--At the next Hereford Festival there will be
performed a concerted piece by four Short Horns.
* * * * *
[Illustration: STARTLING DISCOVERY ON THE YORKSHIRE COAST.
_Young Tripper_ (_on his first visit to the Sea, becoming suddenly
conscious of the ebbing Tide_). "HI! BILL! JACK! T'WATTER BE A RUNNIN'
OFF! BY GUM, LADS, BUT AI BET SHE'S BRUSSEN SOMEWHERES!"]
* * * * *
THE POOR VIOLINIST.--AN EPISODE, IN THE STYLE OF STERNE.
"_Le Luthier de Cremone_," observed EUGENIUS, "is a pathetic story."
"Indeed, EUGENIUS," replied YORICK, "it is extremely touching. I
protest I never read, or hear it, without emotion."
"The violin," pursued EUGENIUS, "most sensitive, and, as it were,
soulful of human instruments, lends itself, with particular aptness,
to the purposes of literary pathos."
"Dear Sensibility!" said I, "source inexhausted of all that is
precious in our (poetical) joys, or costly in our (dramatic) sorrows!"
"It were well," continued YORICK, drily, "if it were also the source
inexhausted of more that is quick in our sympathy, and practical in
our beneficence. It is scarcely in the columns of the daily news-sheet
that Sensibility usually seeks its much-sought stimulus. And yet but
lately, in the corner of my paper, I encountered a piteous story that
'dear Sensibility' (had it been more romantically environed) might
deliciously have luxuriated in. I protest 'twas as pathetic as
those of MARIA LE FEVRE, or LA FLEUR. It was headed, "Sad Death of a
Well-known Violinist."
"Prithee, dear YORICK, let me hear it," cried EUGENIUS.
"'Twas but the prosaic report of a Coroner's Inquest," pursued YORICK.
"Sensibility would probably have 'skipped' the sordid circumstance.
'FREDERICK MARTIN, aged seventy-two, a well-known Violinist, and
Professor of Music, formerly a member of the orchestra of the Italian
Opera at Her Majesty's and Covent Garden Theatres,' found life too
hard for him. That is all. 'The deceased, a bachelor.'--Heaven help
him!--'had of late been afflicted with deafness, which hindered his
pursuit of his profession, and' (the witness an old friend feared)
'he was recently in straitened circumstances, but he was too proud and
independent to ask or accept assistance.' The old friend, Mr. LEWIS
CHAPUY, Comedian, had 'frequently offered him hospitalities, which
he never accepted.' Offered him hospitalities! Worthy comedian! In
faith, EUGENIUS, 'tis delicately worded. True 'Sensibility' here,
supplemented by practical sympathy. Both, alas! unavailing. Somewhat
of the doggedly independent spirit of the boot-rejecting Dr. JOHNSON
in this poor deaf violinist apparently. Verily, EUGENIUS, the story
requires but the 'decorative art' of the literary sentimentalist
to make it moving, even to the modish. The ingeniously emotional
historian of LA FLEUR would have made much of it."
"My gentle heart already bleeds with it," said I. "But the upshot,
YORICK; the sequel, my friend?"
"'Tis short and simple," responded YORICK. "'The afflicted Violinist'
occupied a room at 34, Compton Street, Brunswick Square, in which he
lived alone. He suffered from lumbago, as well as from a proud spirit
and a broken heart. He had a dread of 'coming to the Workhouse.'
Spectral fear which haunts ever the sensitive and poverty-stricken!
Unreasonable? Perhaps. But not the less agonising. What comfort may
Political Economy and an admirable Poor Law yield to proud-spirited
victims of poverty?"
"But surely," said I, "the compassion of the stranger would gladly
have poured oil and wine into the wounds of his spirit--or into poor
afflicted MARIA's--had he only known."
"Doubtless," said YORICK. "But 'the great Sensorium of the World,'
as--in 'mere pomp of words'--thou dost designate 'Dear Sensibility,'
did _not_ 'vibrate' to the case of this 'well-known Violinist'--until
'twas too late to vibrate to any useful purpose. He was 'found lying
dead in his bed, fully dressed, with the exception of his hat and
boots,' mute as the untouched strings of his own violin. 'He had died
suddenly from syncope, or heart-failure.' Heart-failure, EUGENIUS.
Doth not thy gentle heart fail at the thought? 'Dr. COLLEY found the
body in an advanced stage of decomposition, and life had probably been
extinct since the preceding Thursday night.' Prithee, Sir, is 'MARIA,
sitting pensive under her poplar, more pathetic than this poor broken
musician, dying alone, in his poverty and pride?"
"Indeed, no!" I responded, musingly.
"Those," continued YORICK, "who go, like the 'Knight of the Rueful
Countenance,' in quest of melancholy adventures, need not to make
deliberately 'Sentimental Journeys' through France, or Italy, or
by forest or mountain, picturesque hamlet, or romantic stream. The
purlieus of great cities amongst the poverty-stricken members of
what it is usual to call the 'lower middle-classes,' will furnish
multitudinous subjects for pensive thought, and--what were a whole
world better--for practical benevolence. 'Tis too late, alas! to do
aught for this dead Violinist, but were eyes and pen more sedulously
and sympathetically employed about real, if sordid-seeming, in place
of imaginary, if picturesque, woes, why verily, EUGENIUS, something
more, perchance, might be done in such pitiful cases as that I
have described to thee in non-journalistic language, than what was
formally done by the Coroner's Jury, who--as they were bound to
do, indeed--'_returned a verdict in accordance with the medical
testimony_.'"
* * * * *
[Illustration: PUNCH'S PIC-NIC. THE PARLIAMENTARY MIRAGE.]
* * * * *
LETTERS TO ABSTRACTIONS.
NO. XIII.--TO IRRITATION.
I have just come home from my Club in a state bordering upon
distraction. No great misfortune has happened to me, my dearest
friend has not been black-balled, the Club bore has not had me in his
unrelenting clutches. The waiters have been, as indeed they always
are, civil and obliging, the excellent _chef_ catered with his
usual skill to my simple mid-day wants, my table companions were
good-humoured, cheerful, and pleasantly cynical. What then, you may
ask, has happened to shatter my nerves and impair my temper for the
day? It is a simple matter, and I am almost ashamed to confess it
openly. But I am encouraged by the fact that two eminently solid and,
so far as I could see, perfectly unemotional gentlemen were as deeply
pricked and worried by what happened as I was myself. To begin with,
I do not admit that my nerves vibrate more easily than those of my
fellow-men. I have never killed an organ-grinder, I am guiltless of
the blood of a German band, I have even gone so far as to spare guards
who asked for my railway-ticket after I had carefully wrapped myself
up for a journey, and no touting vendor of subscription books or works
of art can truthfully say that I have kicked him. On the whole I think
I am reasonably even-tempered and of higher than average amiability.
Others may judge me differently. I don't wish to quarrel with them. I
simply reiterate my opinion. Why then am I to-day in a seething state
of exception to my rule? Here is the cause:
[Illustration]
After I had done with my luncheon, and had puffed a friendly cigar,
I proceeded to that room in the Club which is specially dedicated to
literature and silence. What a feast of multitudinous periodicals is
there spread out, how brightly the variegated array of books from
the circulating library attracts the leisurely, how dignified and
awe-inspiring are the far-stretching ranks of accumulated volumes upon
the shelves. And the carpet, how soft, and the chairs how comfortably
easy. Into one of these chairs I sank with a religious novel (I merely
mention the fact, whether for praise or blame I care not), and began
to think deeply about various life-problems that have much distressed
me. Why must men wear themselves out prematurely with labour? Why
must we suffer? And why, granting the necessity for pain, should I
occasionally sink under a toothache, while HARRISON, a blatant fellow
with a red face and a loud voice, continues in a condition of robust
and oppressive health? These speculations were not so painful and
disturbing as might be supposed. Indeed, they had a soothing effect.
From the rhythmical breathing and the closed eyes of two other
occupants of arm-chairs, I judged that they were similarly occupied
in philosophic reflection. I was just composing myself to a bout of
specially hard thinking, when, lo, the door opened, and in stepped Dr.
FUSSELL!
Everybody, I take it, knows Dr. FUSSELL. He is a member of countless
learned Societies. Over many of them he presides, to some he acts
as secretary. He reads papers on abstruse questions connected with
sanitation, he dashes with a kind of wild war-whoop into impassioned
newspaper controversies on the component elements of a dust particle,
or the civilisation of the Syro-Phoenicians. He is acute, dialectical,
scornful and furious. He denounces those who oppose him as the meanest
of mankind, he extols his supporters as the most illustrious and
reasonable of all who have benefited the human race. In the Club he
is always engaged in some investigation which keeps him continuously
skipping from bookshelf to bookshelf, climbing up ladders to reach
the highest shelves, rushing up and down-stairs with sheaves of paper
bulging in his coat-pockets, or stowed under his arms. He lays his
top-hat on the table, and makes it a receptacle for reams of notes and
volumes of projected essays. In a word, he is a human storm.
Well, in he came with his grey hair streaming over his forehead, and
his eyes aflame. I knew in a moment that repose in his presence was
out of the question, though I still sat on, hoping against hope.
First, the Doctor bounded to the fire-place, seized the poker, and
began to rummage the fire. It was a good fire, and had done nothing
to deserve this punishment. I shifted on my seat; the two other
philosophers opened their eyes and frowned, and still Dr. FUSSELL
continued to rummage. Now I knew, not only that that fire was being
poked on an entirely wrong principle, but that I alone knew how it
ought to be poked. My fingers itched, my whole body tingled with
excitement. At last Dr. FUSSELL ceased. In a moment I was out of my
seat and making a bee-line for the poker. I just managed to beat the
other two by a short head, seized the poker, and relieved my soul
by stirring the fire on strictly scientific principles. The others
watched me hungrily. When I had finished, each of them took a short
turn with the poker, and then we all returned, more or less appeased,
to our seats.
But we had not done with the ineffable FUSSELL. By this time he was on
the top of a step-ladder. Slowly he selected six tomes, and began his
perilous descent. Our eyes were riveted upon him. Crash, bang! His
arms were empty, and the unconscionable books fluttered and clattered
to the floor. Slowly and ruefully did FUSSELL descend into the cloud
of dust and gather his bruised treasures from the carpet. At last he
heaped them on his table, and began to write. We hoped for peace,
but it was not to be. A sudden thought struck him. He would sew his
scattered leaves of MS. together. With dreadful deliberation he took
needle and cotton from a little pocket housewife that he carried with
him; and then began one of the most maddening performances I have
ever watched. Carefully he held the needle to the light, carefully he
wetted and trimmed his cotton to a point. And for ten stricken minutes
we saw him miss the eye of the needle, sometimes by an inch, sometimes
by a hair's breadth. It was a thrilling contest between obstinacy and
evasiveness. I was fascinated by it. Every time, as the cotton neared
the eye, my heart slowly ascended into my mouth, only to drop with a
fatal swiftness into my boots as the triumphant needle scored another
victory. I began to imitate FUSSELL's every movement. I threaded
invisible needles by the gross with imperceptible cotton. I felt in
my own breast all the ardour of the chase, all the bitter sorrow of
repeated failures. My two companions in misfortune were similarly
affected, and there we sat, three sane and ordinary men, feverishly
going through all these itching movements with FUSSELL as our
detested, but unconscious fugleman. The strain became too great. I
sprang from my chair, "Sir," I said to the astonished FUSSELL, "permit
me; I learnt the art of threading needles as a boy from an East End
seamstress," and before he had time to protest, I had seized the
offending instruments, and by a stroke of inspiration had passed the
cotton through. Then without waiting to hear what FUSSELL might have
to say, I fled from the room. And here consequently I sit with my
nerves shattered, and an untasted crumpet cooling on the tea-tray.
Am I singular? I think not. There are others whose mannerisms plague
me too. For instance, TRUBERRY, whom I meet occasionally, has a wild
and venomous habit of relating to me his infinitesimal jokelets. That
I could pardon. But when, having related one, he bursts, as he always
does, into a helpless suffocation of purple laughter, the savage
within me awakes and I murder TRUBERRY in fancy to an accompaniment
of refined and protracted tortures. Once, as I helped him on with his
overcoat, he joked and exploded. My fingers were horribly near his
throat. But I mastered the impulse, and TRUBERRY will never know how
near he was to destruction. And to make matters worse, he is one
of the kindest and most considerately helpful of human beings. Oh,
IRRITATION, IRRITATION, you have much to answer for. The fly in the
ointment of the apothecary was a baby to you. Avaunt, avaunt!
DIOGENES ROBINSON.
* * * * *
THE VERY LATEST.--Mrs. RAM had a paragraph read to her from the
_D.T.'s_ "London Day by Day," recounting how the Archbishop of
CANTERBURY when staying at Haddo House, had attended service in the
parish Kirk, which conduct might have provoked High Churchmen to
assail him for "bowing the knee in the House of Rimmon." Thinking
it over afterwards, when she had muddled up the name in her usual
fashion, our old friend Mrs. R. observed, with some humour, that she
thought "the Archbishop had shown his good scents by going to the
House of RIMMEL."
* * * * *
NOTICE.--Rejected Communications or Contributions, whether MS.,
Printed Matter, Drawings, or Pictures of any description, will in no
case be returned, not even when accompanied by a Stamped and Addressed
Envelope, Cover, or Wrapper. To this rule there will be no exception.