The Tories are, truly,Conservativeelves,For every one knows they take care of themselves.
The Tories are, truly,Conservativeelves,For every one knows they take care of themselves.
The Tories are, truly,Conservativeelves,
For every one knows they take care of themselves.
The public will be delighted to learn, there can be no doubt, as to the elegant acquirements of the variousattachésof the new Tory premier. The peculiar avidity with which they one and all appear determined to secure the salaries for their various suppositionary services, must convince the most sceptical that they have carefully studied the art of drawing.
None but Ministers know what Ministers go through for the pure love of their country; no person who has not reposed in the luxuriously-cushioned chairs of the Treasury or Downing-street can conceive the amount of business Sir Robert and his colleagues have transacted during the three months they have been in office. The people, we know, have been crying for bread—the manufacturers are starving—but their rebellious appetites will be appeased—their refractory stomachs will feel comforted, when they are told all that their friends the Tories have been doing for them. How will they blush for their ingratitude when they find that the following great measures have been triumphantly carried through Parliament by Sir Robert’s exertions—The VENTILATING OF THE HOUSE BILL! Think of that, ye thin-gutted weavers of Manchester. Drop down on your marrow-bones, and bless the man who gives your representatives fresh air—though he denies you—a mouthful of coarse food. Then look at his next immense boon—The ROYAL KITCHEN-GARDEN BILL! What matters it that the gaunt fiend Famine sits at your board, when you can console yourselves with the reflection that cucumbers and asparagus will be abundant in the Royal Kitchen Garden! But Sir Robert does not stop here. What follows next?—The FOREIGN BISHOPS’ BILL! See how our spiritual wants are cared for by your tender-hearted Tories—they shudder at the thoughts of Englishmen being fed on foreign corn; but they give them instead, a full supply of Foreign Bishops. After that comes—The REPORT OF THE LUNATICS’ BILL. This important document has been founded on the proceedings in the Upper House, and is likely to be of vast service to the nation at large. Next follows the EXPIRING LAWS’ BILL! We imagine that a slight error has been made in the title of this bill, and that it should be read “ExpiringJusticeBill!” As to expiring laws—‘tis all a fallacy. One of the glorious privileges of the English Constitution is, that the laws never expire—neither do the lawyers—they are everlasting. Justice may die in this happy land, but law—never!
Again, there is a little grant of some thousands for Prince Albert’s stables and dog-kennels! Very proper too; these animals must be lodged, ay, and fed; and the people—the creatures whom God made after his own image—the poor wretches who want nothing but a little bread, will lie down hungry and thankful, when they reflect that the royal dogs and horses are in the best possible condition. But we have not yet mentioned the great crowning work of Ministers—the Queen’s speech on the Prorogation of the Parliament last week. What an admirable illustration it was of that profound logical deduction—that, out of nothing comes nothing! Yet it was deduction—that, out of nothing comes nothing! Yet it was not altogether without design, and though some sneering critics have called the old song—the burthen of it was clearly—
A man drops a slop bucket on a gentleman.DOWN WITH YOUR DUST.
DOWN WITH YOUR DUST.
MR. SILK BUCKINGHAM being unmercifully reproached by his unhappy publisher upon the dreadful weight of his recent work on America, fortunately espied the youngest son of the enraged and disappointed vendor of volumes actually flying a kite formed of a portion of the first volume. “Heavy,” retorted Silk, “nonsense, sir. Look there! so volatile and exciting is that masterly production, that it has even made that youthful scion of an obdurate line, spite my teetotal feelings,
A windy clothes line with three sheets on it.“THREE SHEETS IN THE WIND.”
“THREE SHEETS IN THE WIND.”
[pg 160]
Perhaps no one operation of frequent recurrence and absolute necessity involves so much mental pain and imaginative uneasiness as the reduction of thoughts to paper, for the furtherance of epistolatory correspondence. Some great key-stone to this abstruse science—some accurate data from which all sorts and conditions of people may at once receive instruction and assistance, has been long wanting.
Letter-writers, in general, may be divided into two great classes, viz.: those who write to ask favours, and those who write to refuse them. There is a vague notion extant, that in former days a third genus existed—though by no means proportionate to the other two—they were those who wrote “to grant favours;” these were also remarkable for enclosing remittances and paying the double postage—at least, so we are assured; of our knowledge, we can advance nothing concerning them and their (to us) supposititious existence, save our conviction that the race has been long extinct.
Those who write to ask, may be divided into—
Those who write to refuse, are
We are confident of ensuring the everlasting gratitude of the above parties by laying before them the proper formulæ for their respective purposes; and, therefore, as all the world is composed of two great classes, which, though they run into various ramifications, still retain their original distinguishing characteristics—namely, that of being either “debtors” or “creditors”—we will give the general information necessary for the construction of their future effusions.
(Firstly.)
From a wine-merchant, being a creditor, to a right honourable, being a debtor.
Verjuice-lane, City, January 17, 1841.
MY LORD,—I have done myself the honour of forwarding your lordship a splendid sample of exquisite Frontignac, trusting it will be approved of by your lordship. I remain, enclosing your lordship’s small account, the payment of which will be most acceptable to your lordship’s most
Obedient very humble servant,GILBERT GRIPES.
The sample is tolerable—send in thirty dozen—add them to your account—and let my steward have them punctually on December 17, 1849.
BOSKEY.
P.S.—I expect you’ll allow discount.
(Secondly.)
From a creditor, being a “victim,” “schneider,” “sufferer,” or “tailor,” to one who sets off his wares by wearing the same, being consequently a debtor.
HONOURED SIR,—I can scarcely express my delight at your kind compliments as to the fit and patterns of the last seventy-three summer waistcoats; the rest of the order is in hand. I enclose a small account of 490l. odd, which will just meet a heavy demand. Will you, sir, forward the same by return of post, to your obliged and devoted
Humble servant,ADOLPHUS JULIO BACKSTITCH.
P. Pink, Esq., &c. &c.
Albany.
You be d—d,Backstitch.
PENTWISTLE PINK.
(Thirdly.)
From a constituent in the country, being a creditor “upon promises,” to a returned member of Parliament in town.
Bumbleton Butts, April 1, 1841.
DEAR SIR,—The enthusiastic delight myself (an humble individual) and the immense body of your enraptured constituents felt upon reading your truly patriotic, statesman-like, learned, straightforward and consistent speech, may be conceived by a person of your immense parliamentary imagination, but cannot be expressed by my circumscribed vocabulary. In stating that my trifling exertions for the return of such a patriot are more than doubly recompensed by your noble conduct, may I be allowed to suggest the earnest wish of my eldest son to be in town, for the pleasure of being near such a representative, which alone induces him to accept the situation of landing-waiter you so kindly insisted upon his preparing for. You will, I am sure, be happy to learn, the last baby, as you desired is christened after:—“the country’s, the people’s, nay, the world’s member!”
Believe me, with united regards from Mrs. F. and Joseph, ever your staunch supporter and admirer,
FUNK FLAT.
To Gripe Gammon, Esq., M.P.
(Fourthly.)
St. Stephen’s.
DEAR AND KIND CONSTITUENT,—I am more than happy. My return for your borough has satisfiedyou, my country, and myself! What can I say more? Pray give both my names to the dear innocent. Be careful in the spelling, two “M’s” in Gammon, one following the A, the other preceding the O, and immediately next to the final N. I think I have now answered every point of your really Junisean letter. Let me hear from yousoon—you cannot TOO SOON—and believe me,
My dear Funk, yours ever,GRIPE GAMMON.
Funk Flat, Esq., &c. &c.
(Fifthly.)
Bumbleton Butts, April 4, 1841.
MY DEAR FRIEND AND PATRON,—All’s right, the twoM’sare intheirplaces, when will Joe be inhis?I know your heart; pray excuse my earnestness, but oblige me with an early answer. Joe is dying to be near so kind, so dear, so sincere a friend.
More devotedly than ever yours,FUNK FLAT
G. Gammon, Esq., M.P., &c. &c.
(Sixthly.)
St. Stephen’s.
How can I express my feelings?Myname,mineengrafted on the innocent offspring of the thoroughbred Funks, evermore to be by them and their heirs handed down to posterity! How I rejoice at that circumstance, and the intelligence I have so happily received about the wretched situation you speak of. Fancy, Funk, fancy the man, your son, in a moment of rashness, I meant to succeed, died of a sore-throat! an infallible disorder attendant upon the duties of those d—d landing-waiterships. What an escape we have had! The place is given to my butler, so there’s no fear. Kiss the child, and believe me ever,
Your sincere and much relieved friend,GRIPE GAMMON.
To Funk Flat, Esq., &c. &c.
From this time forward the correspondence, like “Irish reciprocity,” is “all on one side.” It generally consists of four-and-twenty letters from the constituent in the country to the returned member in town. As these arenever opened, all that is required is a well-written direction, on ablank sheet of paper.
(Seventhly.)
(Several.)
DEAR FATHER,—Studies continued—(blot)—profession—future hopes—application—increased expenses—irate landlady—small remittance—duty—love—say twenty-five pounds—best wishes—sister, mother, all at home.
Dutiful son,JOHN JOSKIN.
(Eighthly.)
Delighted—assiduity—future fortune—great profession!—Increase of family—no cash—best prayers, sister, mother.
Loving father!JOSKIN, SEN.
N.B. By altering the relative positions and sexes, the above is good for all relations! If writing to nabob, more flattery in letter of asker. Strong dose of oaths in refuser’s answer.
(Ninthly.)
Brighton.
MY DEAR TOM,—How are you, old fellow? Here I am, as happy as a prince; that is, I should be if you were with me. You know when we first met! what a time it was! do you remember? How the old times come back, and really almost the same circumstances! Pray do you recollect I wanted one hundred and fifty then? isn’t it droll I do now? Send me your check, or bring it yourself.
Ever yours.FITZBROWN SMITH.
T. Tims, Esq.
(Tenthly.)
OLD FELLOW,—Glad to hear you are so fresh! Give you joy—wish I was with you, but can’t come. Damn the last Derby—regularly stump’d—cleaned out—and done Brown!—not a feather to fly with! Need I say how sorry I am. Here’s your health in Burgundy. Must make a raise for my Opera-box and a new tilbury. Just lost my last fifty at French hazard.
Ever, your most devoted friend,T. TIMS.
F. Smith, Esq.
[pg 161]
At the little town of Stocksbawler, on the Lower Rhine, in the year of grace 1830, resided one Hans Scrapschins, an industrious and close-shaving barber. His industry met with due encouragement from the bearded portion of the community; and the softer sex, whose greatest fault is fickleness, generally selected Hans for the honour of new-fronting them, when they had grown tired of the ringlets nature had bestowed and which time had frosted.
Hans continued to shave and thrive, and all the careful old burghers foretold of his future well-doing; when he met with a misfortune, which promised for a time to shut up his shop and leave him a beggar. He fell in love.
Neighbours warned Hans of the consequences of his folly; but all remonstrance was vain. Customers became scarce, wearing out their patience and their wigs together; the shop became dirty, and winter saw the flies of summer scattered on his show-board.
Agnes Flirtitz was the prettiest girl in Stocksbawler. Her eyes were as blue as a summer’s sky, her cheeks as rosy as an autumn sunset, and her teeth as white as winter’s snow. Her hair was a beautiful flaxen—not adrab—but that peculiar sevenpenny-moist-sugar tint which the poets of old were wont to call golden. Her voice was melodious; her notes inaltwere equal to Grisi’s: in short, she would have been a very desirable, loveable young lady, if she had not been a coquette.
Hans met her at a festival given in commemoration of the demise of the burgomaster’s second wife—I beg pardon, I mean in celebration of his union with his third bride. From that day Hans was a lost barber. Sleeping, waking, shaving, curling, weaving, or powdering, he thought of nothing but Agnes. His love-dreams placed him in all kinds of awkward predicaments. And Agnes—what thought she of the unhappy barber? Nothing, except that he was a presumptuous puppy, and wore very unfashionable garments. Hans received an intimation of this latter opinion; and, after sundry quailings and misgivings, he resolved to dispose of his remaining stock in trade, and, for once, dress like a gentleman. The measure had been taken by the tailor, the garments had been basted and tried on, and Hans was standing at his door in a state of feverish excitement, awaiting their arrival in a completed condition (as there was to befêteon the morrow, at which Agnes was to be present), when a stranger requested to be shaved. Hans wished him at the —— next barber’s; but there was something so unpleasantly positive in the visitor’s appearance, that he had not the power to object, so politely bowed him into the shop. The stranger removed his cap, and discovered two very ugly protuberances, one on each side of his head, and of most unphrenological appearance. Hans commenced operations—the lather dried as fast as he laid it on, and the razor emitted small sparks as it encountered the bristles on the stranger’s chin, Hans felt particularly uncomfortable, and not a word had hitherto passed on either side, when the stranger broke the ice by asking, rather abruptly, “Have you any schnapps in the house?” Hans jumped like a parched pea. Without waiting for a reply, the stranger rose and opened the cupboard. “I never take anything stronger than water,” said Hans, in reply, to the “pshaw!” which broke from the stranger’s lips as he smelt at the contents of a little brown pitcher. “More fool you,” replied his customer. “Here taste that—some of the richest grape-blood of Rheingau;” and he handed Hans a small flask, which the sober barber respectfully declined. “Ha! ha! and yet you hope to thrive with the women,” said the stranger. “No wonder that Agnes treats you as she does. But drink, man! drink!”
The stranger took a pipe, and coolly seated himself again in his chair, hung one leg over the back of another, and striking his finger briskly down his nose, elicited a flame that ignited his tobacco, and then he puffed, and puffed, till every moth in the shop coughed aloud. The uneasiness of Hans increased, and he looked towards the door with the most cowardly intention; and, lo! two laughing, dimpled faces, were peeping in at them. “Ha! how are you?” said the stranger; “come in! come in!” and to Hans’ horror, two very equivocal damsels entered the shop. Hans felt scandalised, and was about to make a most powerful remonstrance, when he encountered the eye of his impertinent customer; and, from its sinister expression, he thought it wise to be silent. One of the damsels seated herself upon the stranger’s knee, whilst the other looked most coaxingly to the barber; who, however, remained proof to all her winks and blinks, and “wreathed smiles.”
“’Sblitzen!” exclaimed the lady, “the man’s an icicle!”
“Hans, you’re a fool!” said the stranger; and his enamorata concurred in the opinion. The flask was again proffered—the eye-artillery again brought into action, but Hans remained constant to pump-water and Agnes Flirtitz.
The stranger rubbed the palm of his hand on one of his head ornaments, as though he were somewhat perplexed at the contumacious conduct of the barber; then rising, he gracefully led the ladies out. As he stood with one foot on the step of the door, he turned his head scornfully over his shoulder, and said, “Hans, you are nothing but—a barber; but before I eat, you shall repent of your present determination.”
“What security have I that you will keep your word?” replied Hans, who felt emboldened by the outside situation of his customer, and the shop poker, of which he had obtained possession.
“The best in the world,” said the stranger. “Here, take these!” and placing both rows of his teeth in the hands of the astonished Hans, he quietly walked up the street with the ladies.
The astonishment of Hans had somewhat subsided, when Stitz, the tailor, entered with the so-much and the so-long-expected garments. The stranger was forgotten; the door was bolted, the clothes tried on, and they fitted to a miracle. A small three-cornered piece of looking-glass was held in every direction by the delighted tailor, who declared this performance hischef-d’œuvreand Hans felt, for the first time in his life, that he looked like a gentleman. Without a moment’s hesitation, or the slightest hint at discount for ready money, he gave the tailor his last thaler, and his old suit of clothes, as per contract; shook Stitz’s hand at parting, till every bone of the tailor’s fingers ached for an hour afterwards, bolted the door, and went to bed the poorest, but happiest barber in Stocksbawler.
After a restless night, Hans rose the next morning with the oddest sensation in the world. He fancied that the bed was shorter, the chairs lower, and the room smaller, than on the preceding day; but attributing this feeling to the feverish sleep he had had, he proceeded to put on his pantaloons. With great care he thrust his left leg into its proper division, when, to his horror and amazement, he found that he had growntwo feet at least during the night; and that the pantaloons which had fitted so admirably before, were now only knee-breeches. He rushed to the window with the intention of breaking his neck by a leap into the street, when his eye fell upon the strange customer of the preceding day, who was leaning against the gable-end of the house opposite, quietly smoking his meerschaum. Hans paused; then thought, and then concluded that having found an appetite, he had repented of his boast at parting, and had called for his teeth. Being a good-natured lad, Hans shuffled down stairs, and opening the door, called him to come over. The stranger obeyed the summons, but honourably refused to accept of his teeth, except on the conditions of the wager. To Hans’ great surprise he seemed perfectly acquainted with the phenomenon of the past night, and good-naturedly offered to go to Stitz, and inform him of the barber’s dilemma. The stranger departed, and in a few moments the tailor arrived, and having ascertained by his inch measure the truth of Hans’ conjectures, bade him be of good cheer, as he had a suit of clothes which would exactly fit him. They had been made for a travelling giant, who had either forgotten to call for them, or suspected that Stitz would require thegeltbefore he gave up the broadcloth.
The tailor was right—they did fit—and in an hour afterwards Hans was on his way to thefête. When he arrived there many of his old friends stood agape for a few moments: but as stranger things had occurred in Germany than a man growing two feet in one night, they soon ceased to notice the alteration in Hans’ appearance. Agnes was evidently struck with the improvement of the barber’s figure, and for two whole hours did he enjoy the extreme felicity of making half-a-dozen other young gentlemen miserable, by monopolising the arm and conversation of the beauty of Stocksbawler. But pleasure, like fine weather, lasts not for ever; and, as Hans and Agnes turned the corner of a path, his eye again encountered the stranger. Whether it was from fear or dislike he knew not, but his heart seemed to sink, and so did his body; for to his utter dismay, he found that he had shrunk to his original proportions, and that the garment of the giant hung about him in anything but graceful festoons. He felt that he was a human telescope, that some infernal power could elongate or shut up at pleasure.
The whole band of jealous rivals set up the “Laughing Chorus,” and Agnes, in the extremity of her disgust, turned up her nose till she nearly fractured its bridge, whilst Hans rushed from the scene of his disgrace, and never stopped running until he opened the door of his little shop, threw himself into a chair, and laid his head down upon an old “family Bible” which chanced to be upon the table. In this position he continued for some time, when, on raising his head, he found his tormentor and the two ladies, grouped like the Graces, in the centre of the apartment.
“Well, Scrapshins,” said the gentleman, “I have called for my teeth. You see I have kept my promise.” Hans sighed deeply, and the ladies giggled.
“Nay, man, never look so glum! Here, take the flask—forget Agnes, and console yourself with the love of”—
The conclusion of this harangue must for ever remain a mystery; for Hans, at this moment, took up the family volume which had served him for a pillow, and dashed it at the heads of the trio. A scream, so loud that it broke the tympanum of his left ear, seemed to issue from them simultaneously—a thick vapour filled the room, which gradually cleared off, and left no traces of Hans’ visitors but three small sticks of stone brimstone. The truth flashed upon the barber—his visitor was the far-famed Mephistopheles. Hans packed up his remaining wardrobe, razor, strop, soap-dish, scissors and combs, and turned his back upon Stocksbawler forever. Four years passed away, and Hans was again a thriving man, and Agnes Flirtitz the wife of the doctor of Stocksbawler. Another year passed on, and Hans was both a husband and a father; but the coquette who had nearly been his ruin had eloped with thechasseurof a travelling nobleman.
Sir P. Laurie has sent to say that he has looked into Dr. Farr’s “Medical Guide to Nice,” and is much disappointed. He hoped to have seen a print of the eternally-talked of “NiceYoung Man,” in the costume of the country. He doubts, moreover, that the Doctor has ever been there, for his remarks show him not to have been “overNice.”
Dr. Coombe, in his new work upon America, by some anatomical process, invariably connects large lungs with expansive intellect. Our and Finsbury’s friend, Tom Duncombe, declares, in his opinion, this must be the origin of the received expression for the mighty savans, viz., the “lights of literature.”
[pg 162]
Was there ever anything so lucky that the strike of the masons should have happened at this identical juncture! Parliament is prorogued. Now, deducting Sir Robert Peel, physician, with his train of apothecaries and pestle-and-mortar apprentices, who, until February next, are to sit cross-legged and try to think, there are at least six hundred and thirty unemployed members of the House of Commons, turned upon the world with nothing, poor fellows! but grouse before them. Some, to be sure, may pick their teeth, in the Gardens of the Tuileries—some may even now venture to exercise their favourite elbow at Baden-Baden,—but with every possible and probable exception, there will yet be hundreds of unemployed law-makers, to whom time will be a heavy porter’s burden.
We have a plan which, for its originality, should draw down upon us the gratitude of the nation. It is no other than this: to make all Members of Parliament, for once in their lives at least, useful. The masons, hired to build the new temples of Parliament, have struck. The hard-handed ingrates,—let them go! We propose that, during the prorogation at least, Members of Parliament, should, like beavers, build their own Houses. In a word, every member elected to a seat in Parliament should be compelled, like Robinson Crusoe, to make his own furniture before he could sit down upon it.
Have we not a hundred examples of the peculiar fitness of the task, in the habits of what in our human arrogance we call the lower animals? There is many a respectable spider who would justly feel himself calumniated by any comparison between him and any one of twenty Parliamentary lawyers wecouldname; yet the spider spins its own web, and seeks its own nook of refuge from the Reform Broom of Molly the housemaid. And then, the tiny insect, the ant—that living, silent monitor to unregarding men—doth it not make its own galleries, build with toilsome art its own abiding place? Does not the mole scratch its own chamber—the carrion kite build its own nest! Shall cuckoos and Members of Parliament alone be lodged at others’ pains?
Consider the wasp, oh, STANLEY! mark its nest of paper.—(it is said, on wasp’s paper you are wont to write your thoughts on Ireland)—and resolutely seize a trowel!
Look to the bee, oh, COLONEL SIBTHORP! See how it elaborates its virgin wax, how it shapes its luscious cone—and though we would not trust you to place a brick upon a brick, nevertheless you may, under instruction, mix the mortar!
Ponder on the rat and its doings, most wise BURDETT—see how craftily it makes its hole—and though you are too age-stricken to carry a hod, you may at least do this much—sift the lime.
But wherefore thus particular—why should we dwell on individuals? Pole-cat, weasel, ferret, hedgehog, with all your vermin affinities, come forth, and staring reproachfully in the faces of all prorogued Members, bid them imitate your zeal and pains, and—the masons having struck—build their Houses for themselves.
(We make this proposal in no thoughtless—no bantering spirit. He can see very little into the most transparent mill-stone who believes that we pen these essays—essays that will endure and glisten as long, ay as long as the freshest mackerel—if he think that we sit down to this our weekly labour in a careless lackadaisical humour. By no means. Like Sir LYTTON BULWER, when he girds up his loins to write an apocryphal comedy, we approach our work with graceful solemnity. Like Sir LYTTON, too, we always dress for the particular work we have in hand. Sir LYTTON wrote “Richelieu” in a harlequin’s jacket (sticking pirate’s pistols in his belt, ere he valorouslytookwhole scenes from a French melo-drama):wepenned our last week’s essay in a suit of old canonicals, with a tie-wig askew upon our beating temples, and are at this moment cased in a court-suit of cut velvet, with our hair curled, our whiskers crisped, and a masonic apron decorating our middle man. Having subsided into our chair—it is in most respects like the porphyry piece of furniture of the Pope—and our housekeeper having played the Dead March in Saul on our chamber organ (BULWER wrote “The Sea Captain” to the preludizing of a Jew’s-harp), we enter on our this week’s labour. We state thus much, that our readers may know with what pains we prepare ourselves for them. Besides, when BULWER thinks it right that the world should know that the idea of “La Vailière” first hit him in the rotonde of a French diligence, modest as we are, can we suppose that the world will not be anxious to learn in what coloured coat we think, and whether, when we scratch our head to assist the thought that sticks by the way, we displace a velvet cap or a Truefitt’s scalp?)
Reader, the above parenthesis may be skipped or not. Read not a line of it—the omission will not maim our argument. So to proceed.
If we cast our eyes over the debates of the last six months, we shall find that hundreds of members of the House of Commons have exhibited the most extraordinary powers of ill-directed labour. And then their capacity of endurance! Arguments that would have knocked down any reasonable elephant have touched them no more than would summer gnats. Well, why not awake this sleeping strength? Why not divert a mischievous potency into beneficial action? Why should we confine a body of men to making laws, when so many of them might be more usefully employed in wheeling barrows? Now there is Mr. PLUMPTRE, who has done so much to make English Sundays respectable—would he not be working far more enduring utility with pickaxe or spade than by labouring at enactments to stop the flowing of the Thames on the Sabbath? Might not D’ISRAELI be turned into a very jaunty carpenter, and be set to the light interior work of both the Houses? His logic, it is confessed, will support nothing; but we think he would be a very smart hand at a hat-peg.
As for much of the joinery-work, could we have prettier mechanics than Sir James GRAHAM and Sir Edward KNATCHBULL? When we remember their opinions on the Corn Laws, and see that they are a part of the cabinet which has already shown symptoms of some approaching alteration of the Bread Tax—when we consider their enthusiastic bigotry for everything as it is, and Sir Robert PEEL’S small, adventurous liberality, his half-bashful homage to the spirit of the age—sure we are that both GRAHAM and KNATCHBULL, to remain component members of the Peel Cabinet, must be masters of the science of dove-tailing; and hence, the men of men for the joinery-work of the new Houses of Parliament.
Again how many members from their long experience in the small jobbery of committees—from their profitable knowledge of the mysteries of private bills and certain other unclean work which may, if he please, fall to the lot of the English senator—how many of these lights of the times might build small monuments of their genius in the drains, sewerage, and certain conveniences required by the deliberative wisdom of the nation? We have seen the plans of Mr. BARRY, and are bound to praise the evidence of his taste and genius; but we know that the structure, however fair and beautiful to the eye, must have its foul places; and for the dark, dirty, winding ways of Parliament—reader, take a list of her Majesty’s Commons, and running your finger down their names, pick us out three hundred able-bodied labourers—three hundred stalwart night workmen in darkness and corruption. We ask the country, need it care for the strike of Peto’s men (the said Peto, by the way, is in no manner descended fromFalstaff’sretainer), when there is so much unemployed labour, hungering only for the country’s good?
We confess to a difficulty in finding among the members of the present Parliament a sufficient number of stone-squarers. When we know that there are so few among them who can look upon more thanone sideof a question, we own that the completion of the building may be considerably delayed by employing only members of Parliament as square workmen: the truth is, having never been accustomed to the operation, they will need considerable instruction in the art. Those, however, rendered incapable, by habit and nature, of the task, may cast rubbish and carry a hod.
We put it to the patriotism of members of Parliament, whether they ought not immediately to throw themselves into the arms of Peto and Grissell, with an enthusiastic demand for tools. If they be not wholly insensible of the wants of the nation and of their own dignity, Monday morning’s sun will shine upon every man of her Majesty’s majority, for once laudably employed in the nation’s good. How delightful then to saunter near the works—how charming then to listen to members of Parliament! What a picture of senatorial industry! For an Irish speech by STANLEY, have we not the more dulcet music of his stone-cutting saw? Instead of an oration from GOULBURN, have we not the shrill note of his ungreased parliamentary barrow? For the “hear, hear” of PLUMPTRE, the more accordant tapping of the hammer—for the “cheer” from INGLIS, the sweeter chink of the mason’s chisel?
And then the moral and physical good acquired by the workmen themselves! After six days’ toil, there is scarcely one of them who will not feel himself wonderfully enlightened on the wants and feelings of labouring man. They will learn sympathy in the most efficient manner—by the sweat of their brow. Pleasant, indeed, ‘twill be to see CASTLEREAGH lean on his axe, and beg, withSly, for “a pot of the smallest ale.”
Having, we trust, remedied the evils of the mason’s strike—having shewn that the fitness of things calls upon the Commons, in the present dilemma, to build their own house—we should feel it unjust to the government not to acknowledge the good taste which, as we learn, has directed that an estimate be taken of the disposable space on the walls of the new buildings, to be devoted to the exalted work of the historical painter. Records of the greatness of England are to endure in undying hues on the walls of Parliament.
This is a praiseworthy object, but to render it important and instructive, the greatest judgment must be exercised in the selection of subjects; which, for ourselves, we would have to illustrate the wisdom and benevolence of Parliament. How beautifully would several of the Duke of WELLINGTON’S speeches paint! For instance, his portrait of a famishing Englishman, the drunkard and the idler, no other man (according to his grace) famishing in England! And then the Duke’s view of the shops of butchers, and poulterers, and bakers—all in the Dutch style—by which his grace has lately proved, that if there be distress, it can certainly not be for want of comestibles! But the theme is too suggestive to be carried out in a single paper.
We trust that portraits of members will be admitted. BURDETT and GRAHAM, half-whig, half-tory, in the style of Death and the Lady, will make pretty companion pictures.
To do full pictorial justice to the wisdom of the senate, Parliament will want a peculiar artist: that gifted man CAN be no other than the artist to PUNCH!
Q.
[pg 163]
A poor family with three small children.THE IMPROVIDENT; OR, TURNED UPON THE WIDE WORLD.
THE IMPROVIDENT; OR, TURNED UPON THE WIDE WORLD.
[pg 165]
For the first two months of the first winter session the fingers of the new man are nothing but ink-stains and industry. He has duly chronicled every word that has fallen from the lips of every professor in his leviathan note book; and his desk teems with reports of all the hospital cases, from the burnt housemaid, all cotton-wool and white lead, who set herself on fire reading penny romances in bed, on one side of the hospital, to the tipsy glazier who bundled off his perch and spiked himself upon the area rails on the other. He becomes a walking chronicle of pathological statistics, and after he has passed six weeks in the wards, imagines himself an embryo Hunter.
To keep up his character, a new man ought perpetually to carry a stethoscope—a curious instrument, something like a sixpenny toy trumpet with its top knocked off, and used for the purpose of hearing what people are thinking about, or something of the kind. In the endeavour to acquire a perfect knowledge of its use he is indefatigable. There is scarcely a patient but he knows the exact state of their thoracic viscera, and he talks of enlarged semilunar valves, and thickened ventricles with an air of alarming confidence. And yet we rather doubt his skill upon this point; we never perceived anything more than a sound and a jog, something similar to what you hear in the cabin of a fourpenny steam-boat, and especially mistrusted the “metallic tinkling,” and the noise resembling a blacksmith’s bellows blowing into an empty quart-pot, which is called thebruit de soufflet. Take our word, when medicine arrives at such a pitch that the secrets of the human heart can be probed, it need not go any further, and will have the power of doing mischief enough.
The new man does not enter much into society. He sometimes asks a few other juniors to his lodgings, and provides tea and shrimps, with occasional cold saveloys for their refection, and it is possible he may add some home-made wine to the banquet. Their conversation is exceedingly professional; and should they get slightly jocose, they retail anatomical paradoxes, technical puns, and legendary “catch questions,” which from time immemorial have been the delight of all new men in general, and country ones in particular.
But diligent and industrious as the new man may be, he is mortal after all, and being mortal, is not proof against temptation—at least, after five or six weeks of his pupilage have passed. The good St. Anthony resisted all the endeavours of the Evil One to lure him from the proper path, until the gentleman of the discolouredcutis veraassumed the shape of a woman. The new man firmly withstands all inducements to irregularity until his first temptation appears in the form of the Cyder-cellars—the convivial Rubicon which it is absolutely necessary for him to pass before he can enrol himself as a member of the quiet, hard-working, modest fraternity of the Medical Student of our London Hospitals.
Facilis descensus Averni.—The steps that lead from Maiden-lane to the Cyder-cellars are easy of descent, although the return is sometimes attended with slight difficulty. Not that we wish to compare our favouritesouterrainin question to the “Avernus” of the Latin poet; oh, no! If Æneas had met with roast potatoes and stout during his celebrated voyage across the Styx to the infernal regions, and listened to songs and glees in place of the multitude of condemned souls, “horrendum stridens,” we wager that he would have been in no very great hurry to return. But we have arrived at an important point in our physiology—the first launch of the new man into the ocean of his London life, and we pause upon its shore. He has but definite ideas of three public establishments at all intimately connected with his professional career—the Hall, the College, and the Cyder-cellars. There are but three individuals to whom he looks with feelings of deference—Mr. Sayer of Blackfriars, Mr. Belfour of Lincoln’s-inn-fields, and Mr. Rhodes of Maiden-lane. These are the impersonation of the Fates—the arbitrators of his destinies.
As it is customary that an attendance in the Theatre of Lectures should precede the student’s determination to “have a shy at the College,” or “go up to the Hall,” so is it usual for a visit to one of the theatres to be paid before going down to the Cyder-cellars. The new man has been beguiled into the excursion by the exciting narratives of his companions, and beginning to feel that he is behind the other “chaps” (a new man’s term) in knowledge of the world, he yields to the attraction held out; not because he at first thinks it will give him pleasure so to do, as because it will put him on a level with those who have been, on the same principle as our rambling compatriots go to Switzerland and the Rhine. His Mentor is ready in the shape of a third-season man, and under his protecting influence he sallies forth.
The theatres have concluded; every carriage, cab, and “coach ‘nhired” in their vicinity is in motion; venders of trotters and ham-sandwiches are in full cry; the bars of the proximate retail establishments are crowded with thirsty gods; ruddy chops and steaks are temptingly displayed in the windows of the supper-houses, and the turnips and carrots in the freshly-arrived market-carts appear astonished at the sudden confusion by which they are surrounded. Amidst this confusion the new man and his friends arrive beneath the beacon which illumines the entrance of the tavern. He descends the stairs in an agony of anticipation, and feverishly trips up the six or eight succeeding ones to arrive at the large room. A song has just concluded, and he enters triumphantly amidst the thunder of applause, the jingling of glasses, the imperious vociferations of fresh orders, and an atmosphere of smoke that pervades the whole apartment, like dense clouds of incense burning at the altar of the genius of conviviality.
The new man is at first so bewildered, that it would take but little extra excitement to render him perfectly unconscious as to the probability of his standing upon hisoccipito-frontalisorplantar fascia. But as he collects his ideas, he contrives to muster sufficient presence of mind to order a Welsh rabbit, and in the interim of its arrival earnestly contemplates the scene around him. There is the room which, in after life, so vividly recurs to him, with its bygonesouvenirsof mirth, when he is sitting up all night at a bad case in the mud cottage of a pauper union. There are its blue walls, its wainscot and its pillars, its lamps and ground-glass shades, within which the gas jumps and flares so fitfully; its two looking-glasses, that reflect the room and its occupants from one to the other in an interminable vista. There also is Mr. Rhodes, bending courteously over the backs of the visiters’ chairs, and hoping everybody has got everything to their satisfaction, or bestowing an occasional subdued acknowledgment upon anhabituéwho chances to enter; and the professional gentlemen all laying their heads together at the top of the table to pitch the key of the next glee; and the waiters bustling up and down with all sorts of tempting comestibles; and the gentleman in the Chesterfield wrapper smoking a cigar at the side of the room, while he leans back and contemplates the ceiling, as if his whole soul was concentrated in its smoke-discoloured mouldings.
The new man is in ecstasies; he beholds the realization of the Arabian Nights, and when the harmony commences again, he is fairly entranced. At first, he is fearful of adding the efforts of his laryngeal “little muscles with the long names” to swell the chorus; but, after the second glass of stout and a “go of whiskey,” he becomes emboldened, and when the gentleman with the bass voice sings about the Monks of Old, what a jovial race they were, our friend trolls out how “they laughed, ha, ha!” so lustily, that he gets quite red in the face from obstructed jugulars, and applauds, when it has concluded, until everything upon the table performs a curious ballet-dance, which is only terminated by the descent of the cruets upon the floor.
The precise hour at which the new man arrives at home, after this eventful evening, has never been correctly ascertained; having a latch-key, he is the only person that could give any authentic information upon this point; but, unfortunately, he never knows himself. Some few things, however, are universally allowed, namely, that in extreme cases he is found asleep on the rug at the foot of the stairs next morning, with the rushlight that was left in the passage burnt quite away, and all the solder of the candlestick melted into little globules. More frequently he knocks up the people of the neighbouring house, under the impression that it is his own, but that a new keyhole has been fitted to the door in his absence; and, in the mildest forms of the disease, he drinks up all the water in his bed-room during the night, and has a propensity for retiring to rest in his pea-coat and Bluchers, from the obstinate tenacity of his buttons and straps. The first lecture the next morning fails to attract him; he eats no breakfast, and when he enters the dissecting-room about one o’clock, his fellow-students administer to him a pint of ale, warmed by the simple process of stirring it with a hot poker, with some Cayenne pepper thrown into it, which he is assured will set to rights the irritable mucous lining of his stomach. The effect of this remedy is, to send him into a sound sleep during the whole of the two o’clock anatomical lecture; and awakened at its close by the applause of the students, he thinks he is still at the Cyder-cellars, and cries out “Encore!”
Having been particularly struck by the infernal smashes that have recently taken place on several railroad lines, and having been ourselves forcibly impressed by a tender, which it must be allowed was rather hard (coming in collision with ourselves), we have thought over the subject, and have now the following suggestions to offer:—
Behind each engine let there be second and third class carriages, so that, in the event of a smash, second and third class lives only would be sacrificed.
Let there be a van full of stokers before the first class carriages; for, as the directors appear to be liberal of the stokers’ lives, it is presumed that every railway company has such a glut of them that they can be spared easily.
As some of the carriages are said to oscillate, from being too heavy at the top, let a few copies of “Martinuzzi” be placed as ballast at the bottom.
In order that the softest possible lining may be given to the carriages, let the interior be covered with copies of Sibthorp’s speeches as densely as possible.
We have not yet been able to find a remedy for the remarkable practice which prevails in some railways of sending a passenger, like a bank-note,cut in half, for better security.