MRS. POTTLETON (BY THE AID OF HER MAMMA) HAVING EXACTED A PROMISE FROM HER HUSBAND OF A NEW HARMONIUM, RECEIVES AN AGREEABLE SURPRISE. "SWEET-CHEEK was a pretty term of endearment a couple of hundred years ago. It might be revived with appropriateness; for not only are the cheeks of our young ladies quité as sweet as those of their ancestors, but to do some of them justice, their characteristic is-of course the nicest, but still-cheek. ZOOLOGICAL-Naturalists tell us that such a thing as a mouse is not now to be found on the Catskill Mountains. THEATRICAL-Not the least important part of the machinery of the modern s'age is the lever de rideau. THE CODE PUNCH. THE following crimes and offences may be committed with impunity, and without fear of consequences: Killing-time. Murdering-an air. Smothering-the feelings. Stifling-a laugh. Striking-a balance. Forging-anchors. Picking-your steps. Stealing-a kiss. Coining-money. Poaching-eggs. Breaking into a gallop Trespassing-on the attention. Beating--carpets. Cutting-jokes. Shooting-Niagara, and Setting the Thames on fire. AGRICULTURAL QUARTER SESSIONS.-The county crop is now reaped, and fields are open for unproductive labour. No grist brought to the treadmill. SURE TO BE So.-The result of all the nonsense that has been talked about the "Two Sexe+ of Man" is, to make one dislike more than ever masculine women. INTERESTING TO COLLECTORS.It may not be generally known that all our earthenware came originally from one place-Potsdam. CULINARY.-Many epicures are of opinion that cooking by gas is not unfavourable to gastronomy. FROM WINDSOR.-Are you a bad sleeper? Always wash your face before going to bed; it is an exellent Soaporific. A PROFESSIONAL VIEW OF THINGS.-When placards of HOLMAN HUNT'S picture of The Pot of Basil were all over London, a sporting friend, up from the country for the Derby, inquired who Basil was, and how much he had won. BY A COMPOSITOR.-Novelists have no hesitation in saying that AUGUSTUS imprinted a kiss on ANASTASIA'S fair cheek. By way of a change, how would it sound, if they were to say stereotyped instead of imprinted? TOAST AND SENTIMENT.-The bank that no cheque will stop. LA CHASSE. THE EFFECTS OF EDUCATION.-Our housemaid (AMEA) is fond of fine words. The other day she gave warning. When asked the reason, instead of the usual answer that she wanted to better herself, she said that she wished to ameliorate herself. ARCHITECTS OF LONDON.-BEAU NASH built Regent Street. HADLEY was the Inventor of the Quadrant. ASTLEY created the Circus. AN IMPOSSIBILITY.-Hanging out clothes on Shepherd's Bush. Sportsman (British). "HULLO! I SAY, YOU'RE NOT GOING TO SHOOT THE BIRD RUNNING?" Chasseur (French). "MAIS, NON, MON AMI; I SALL VAIT TILL HE STOP!" OLD SAW NEW SET. WHEN is a door not a door? Of course, when it's ajar, you'll say. Not at all. The answer is, When it's a Jack Daw. And, apropos of Jack Daws, where should you say was the link between the bird and the fish? It is supplied, it appears, by the Jack Daw on one side, and the John Dory on the other. My uncle was six feet two. He used to take me and BILLY (my brother, arcades ambo twins both, aged eleven), out for a walk. He improved the occasion educationally by telling us how we three illustrated a dactyl. He would playfully walk before us, and say, "Now, here it is: a long followed by two sborts" POOR OLD LADY.-MRS. MALAPROP, whose head just now is full of Ireland, says the doctor tells her there is something the matter with the Irish of her eye. HAS it been noticed that ladies who like long trains are partial to the outskirts? WHY would you expect most gardeners to be proud?-Because they are taught Haughty Culture. Оя! Oн!-If you wanted to write a grand poem like MILTON'S Paradise Lost, what lozenges ought you to eat by way of obtaining inspiration?-Epic-cacuanha. ITALIAN, AND VERY NASTYWhy is a great Saint's day in the Roman Calendar a sore point to touch upon with Catholics?Because it is a Festa. TUESDAY, December 29. The House of Commons sat but for one golden hour, and did nothing but cheer the Ministers, and issue some writs. But mark you now how the hand of a great artist shall beat out that gold, and give you a longsome and important article. The fact is that the nation has set up such a clamour for "a lot of Essence," as the nation inelegantly puts it, that we cannot deny it such a New Year's Gift, the less that it will get no more until Wednesday the 24th February. Fact is, Mr. Punch had some doubt whether it would be prudent in him, as the father of a family, to resume this Essence at all. For he had been so horribly frightened, ever since the Reform Act passed, at the terrific warnings of those who called it a Revolution, that he slept for weeks with revolvers under his pillow, and only discontinued the practice because they slipped down to his toes, and went off in the night to the discomfort of his household. Chaff the new Parliament, he thought. Never. And he beheld in his mind's eye furious mobs electing savage DANTONS, and MARATS, and ROBESPIERRES, who immediately formed themselves into a dreadful tribunal, erected a guillotine in Bride Court, and brought out Mr. Punch to look through the National Window. Doubtless he would have met his fate with decency, but to say nothing of his much preferring not to die at all, consider his life assurances, which would have been vitiated by his execution. He shuddered, and resolved that there should be no more Essence. Then he hid himself, (as it is all over now, he doesn't mind saying that it was in the least likely place in all England to be searched, the abandoned lighthouse on the top of the hill in the enclosed gardens at Purfleet) and made calculations. He discovered that the Reform Act would add one Million to the electoral rolls. As this fact flashed upon him, he became so dreadfully ill that it required all the kindness and a great deal of the champagne of the excellent hotel at Purfleet to bring him to anything like a comfortable state. But he held on somehow, until the elections began. Then, unable to behold any frantic mobs, except through the mind's eyes of some of his contemporaries, he gained a little courage, and abandoned his fears of the National Window. But he said to himself in a legible whisper, "They are going to elect men like the leaders of the Reform League, pretentious, stuck-up folk, of that detestable class that can neither give nor take chaff, or of that more detestable class that can only give and can't take it." And then he thought of a majority of Forcible Feebles having him pulled up to the bar of the House of Commons, and asked how he dared smile at the Representatives of the Millions. "I will never go down on my knees and ask pardon," he said, with a revival of his gallant spirit. I have too much pluck, and respect for my silk stockings for that." But whether the Essence should be written or not bothered him, and he asked counsel of friends, who talked to him the usual nonsense of Friends in Council-not MR. HELPS's, who are the wisest and most delightful councillors he knows. The Elections were over, and again he fled away to his lighthouse to consider the returns. You should have seen him come smiling down the hill, and along the road to order another banquet. He struck the stars with his sublime head. A Revolution. You be disestablished! A Revolution, you disendowed fool! Nothing like it. A Capital Good Parliament, whence he deplores sundry exclusions (as MILL'S, ROEBUCK'S, and BRUCE'S) but composed for the most part of good men and true, of all parties, but with a great majority pledged to support his friend PEELIDES. Educated, wealthy, some titled, all vowing to be governed by no ignorant constituents, but by a resolution to do justice to all men. And the average age of a Parliament-man in 1869 is Fifty Two-just the age that a wise man ought to be-until he becomes fifty-three. That last fact settled him, and he swore that the Essence of Parliament should appear again, and like old Vauxhall, with fifty thousand additional lights, every week. And he pledged himself to do it, too, and took the pledge in Burgundy. Which pledge the former, he now proceeds to redeem, and wishes a Happy New Year to the nation in pledge the latter. As hath been said, the Commons met, and the newly re-elected SPEAKER took the Chair, which means, sat down in it. Took has various meanings, for which see Tooke's Diversions of Purley, and you will not find them. The Ministerial benches were about half filled, out this must not be taken as ominous of ministerial half measures. With Falstaff, we hate an unfilled can. But what would have been the use of a large attendance? There was nothing to do. Why should men spoil their Christmas holidays? Echo answers with a profession of inability to make a satisfactory response. There were very few Opposition Members. Why should they have come, when there was nothing to oppose, except a beestly driving small rain? MR. DUNDAS took the oath (we've only one little oath now) and his seat for the Orkneys. These are islands of the north, and were called Orcades by the Romans, but they were known to the ancients before the circumnavigation of Britain by AGRICOLA, who, as his name implies, having been a husbandman, easily learnt to be a navigator, and might have made railways, if he had thought of it. MR. GLADSTONE, Premier of England, and Member for Greenwich, was loudly cheered on his entrance. We shall always think the better of Greenwich for having made such good use of its new franchise, and shall be happy to show our satisfaction by accepting any invitations to meet pleasant people at either of the great fish-houses. By the way, there has been a plentiful lack of imagination in the Greenwich cooks lately, and we hereby order them to invent a Something à la Gladstone, and let it be an excellent good thing, and let us have no humbugging with old enemies under new names. Somebody says that Punch is a proclaimed Epicure. So he is, but where did EPICURUS place pleasure? În virtue. And is there no virtue in a good dinner? If not-why does it-or what is meant for it and never is precede an appeal for a Charity? Away, and vex not thou great Punch's mind With thy shallow wit, Vex not thou that creature's mind, For thou canst not fathom it. Various Ministers took the oath, but the Right Honourable JOHN BRIGHT made affirmation strong as kiss of Holy Writ. This reminds us of an American story, which has nothing whatever to do with MR. BRIGHT'S case. A poll-clerk, fancying from a voter's hat that he was a Quaker, asked him whether he would swear or affirm, to which the voter, in a pleasant manner, replied, that he was disendowed if he cared which. On a new writ being moved for the County of Louth, which is, we believe, somewhere in Ireland, but we should be louth to say we know where, up and spoke The LORD BURY, son and heir of the EARL OF ALBEMARLE, the Lord of Quiddenham Hall. This frightful Revolutionist (mind you, we don't like it; read CARLYLE, and see how at the beginning of the French revolution certain young aristocrats who had been in Americaand LORD BURY has been in America, and we dare say will declare that he is very happy indeed to have been there-began proposing to abolish old customs-Bury, too-that has a funereal kind of sound) this frightful Revolutionist, we say, inaugurated the destruction of all things by complaining of the inconvenience occasioned by the law which compels the re-election of those who take office under the Crown. He thought he should venture to move, hereafter, for the repeal of that law. Between ourselves, the rule, very proper when Sovereigns were more despotic, and could force a Minister on the nation, has become simply a foolish nuisance, when Ministers can hold office only by permission of Parliament. But then it was made in the days of the good QUEEN ANNE, and it would be disrespectfal to the sainted memory of MRS. TRUEMAN to repeat it. Besides, if you begin abolishing, when will you leave off? It is clear that the spirit that would abolish an old rule merely because it is useless and mischievous, would abolish the Throne and the Altar, nay, the very Precession of the Equinoxes. The House of Commons said nothing to the titled Revolutionist, but let us hope it thought the more, like the Welshman's Bubo, or Owl. More new writs were issued, including one for South Derby, where the vacancy has been caused by the second demise since the general election. Eight more of the Administrators have got to issue addresses, take long journeys in vile weather, make speeches, and come home again, in obedience to the law of the good MRS. TRUEMAN. Her correspondent, DUCHESS FREEMAN, would tell her, if they lived now, that the law was nonsense, and if SARAH didn't put a strong word, such as disestablished, before the noun, her manners would be shown to have mended in Elysium. Nextly, we had some Notices of Motion, but they were mostly given by new Members, whom the gentlemen in the gallery had not seen before, and of course were not bound to know. There is a vast lot of these in the Parliament, and it would be well if each new man would get his name legibly printed in large type, and paste (or gum) it upon the top of his hat. The outside of his hat, we mean, Irish Members. Then the reporters would notice him as he lifted his hat on rising (or he might hold it up towards them for a moment) and his fine oratory would not be set down to an honourable Member," or to a wrong person. MESSRS. HANSARD would, no doubt, print such a thing on moderate terms, or an M.P. may come to Whitefriars, and sit in our office while the MS. is being set up-only he must bring his own cigars. Of the notices, one was anent Local Taxation, one for the Legislation of Trades' Unions (ha! spirit of ROBESPIERRE !!, one for making English and Scotch bankruptcies alike, one (this was for MR. TORRENS) about the asylums for the sick poor, and one (this was by MR. LYSTER O'BEIRNE) for leave to bring in a Bill to facilitate the acquisition of small estates in Ireland. This is a very desirable object, and MR. O'BEIRNE may acquire a small one for us, if he will be so good. Or, on second thoughts, a large one. And we are ashamed to trouble him-but would he make it in England, as we are desirous to reside upon it, and do not care about crossing the Channel? He shall come and see us whenever he likes, nobody welcomer. MINISTER AYRTON, Joint Secretary of the Treasury, then moved that the House, at its rising, should adjourn until Tuesday the 16th February. And being interrogated (we mean asked) as to whether the meeting was for business, he made as brief reply as the American General, in that capital new poem, when told that BOARD OF TRADE, that the public-houses should be closed on the THE suggestion of the Right Honourable the PRESIDENT OF THE nomination day at elections, deserves to be considered. There are, perhaps, some constituencies in which a certain amount of drunkenafford to spend any of their hardly-earned wages in excess of drink. ness prevails, even amongst the class of British electors who cannot Certainly, it might be in a great measure prevented by the closure of toiling millions of this great country? It is surely at the top of the public-houses; but would not that be an ill compliment to the and it would be an invidious distinction to close the public-houses society, as much as at the bottom, that we are to look for drunkenness, without closing also the private cellars, and the clubs. A voter, who gets drunk at Election time, gets drunk on duty. He unfits himself for the exercise of that exalted privilege which is the birthright of every Briton above the residuum. For an elector to be so drunk as not to be capable of giving the name of the candidate whom he means to vote for, is to be drunk and incapable indeed; certainly, to be incapable of performing his lofty constitutional function. Indeed it may be held that any elector so drunk as not to be able to say, distinctly, "British Constitution," is politically drunk and incapable. Suppose, then, gross drunkenness, apparent at the hustings, is subjected by the Legislature to disfranchisement, temporary, or final. On the one hand the public-houses might remain open, and the publicans suffer no injury. On the other, constituencies would be weeded of unworthy voters; of course to the sole detriment of a bigoted and stupid faction and to the unqualified advantage of the party of enlightenment and progress. CHINS AND CHIGNONS. If swells have bristly mouths or no. Not only shave not fogies old, No good by shaving who could gain, Who would have shaved, nor shaved in vain, With soup a fellow now can find; Sparkle on the Bench. WE find, in the Era, the following piece of wit, emitted by the Chairman of the Petty Sessions for the Enfield district of the Duchy of Lancaster. A brace of rogues, male and female, had cheated a publican, and were sent for trial. The male requested that the female might be released on bail, as he would be bound for her. "The CHAIRMAN. O yes. The prison walls will stand bail for both of you." True wit on the bench is so rare that Punch at once immortalises this Chairman, and recommends him to MR. GLADSTONE for Chancellor of the Duchy. |