Punch: Punch (17.1849)

34

PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI.

DOMESTIC HYDROPATHY.

Hydropathy is making its way, and the continual dropping of water on to the mind of the public is
at last producing some impression. Wateris in fact taking a very high position, but its elevation will not
be of long continuance, for it is in the very nature of water to find sooner or later its level. At the pre-
sent moment, hydropathy is being received as a science of the first water, and it has been allowed to find
its way into several domestic establishments. The turncock is in fact the family physician, the cistern
is the medicine chest; the New River is a sort of Apothecaries' Hall, and the doctor's bill comes in, in the
shape of the water rate. This is all very agreeable if it is kept within bounds, and we believe that not
only are water and soap the best soporific, but that the ordinary suds form a sudorific of as salubrious
a kind as any that can be furnished by pharmacy. It is not the use of water, but its abuse we protest
against, and we therefore object to the substitution of the bath itself for the Bath chair, as well as to
the watering of the patient with the watering-pot while lying in his bed, as if he were a geranium, or
any other occupant of an ordinary flower-bed. Such is the out-door treatment under the Domestic
Hydropathic system, which occasionally places the patient under the pump, until it is doubtful whether
he is not as great a pump as the machine by which he allows himself to be played upon.

"DOWN, DOWN, DE'REY DOWN/'

Ministers have at last hit on the plan to make Englishmen zealous financial reformers. Hume and
Gobden, and the Liverpool Financial Reform Association, might have laboured for centuries without
getting half as near their object as Loud John and his colleagues have managed to do in the last twelve
months. It is very kind of them to take such pains to rouse a real feeling for saving amongst us—
to open John Bull's ears to the cry of " Take care of your pockets,"—to prompt a demand for economy
in administration so serious and urgent, that they will have a good excuse for obeying it. Yau don't
suppose Lord John and Lord Grey and the rest are really like pelicans, and take a serious pleasure in
feeding their large brood out of their own blood,—i. e. the country's circulating medium ! On the contrary,
they only want a good reason for saying to those excellent family men, who seem always at home in the
Home Office, and never abroad in the Foreign Office, " My dear fellow, we haven't a decent place to our
backs, or a gentlemanlike salary in our portfolios. Everything is to be done in the cheap style, and the
country no longer appreciates the advantage of having its work done in a slovenly and gentlemanly manner
by men of family. We positively have nothing to give that doesn't require a man of business to do the
work, and doesn't give a miserable salary for doing it. There isn't a clerk in the Foreign Office who
can't knock off a precis, or run up a diplomatic correspondence, and who receives more than half Lombard
Street pay. How can we offer anything of this paltry, hard-working, ill-paid style of thing to one of
ourselves ? "

This is obviously what Ministers want to be at. It must be so. Eor just look what they 're doing.

Imprimis, They 're cutting down everybody's little pickings out of other people's pockets.

They've robbed the landlords of protection. Let them look to their own salaries !

They've robbed the ship-owners of the monopoly of water carriage and extra freights. Let them look
to their Foreign and Colonial Office appointments !

They've abolished the Palace Court. Let them look to their patent places and legal sinecures !

They: re going to knock up the Sessions Bars and the Sessions Attornies. Let them look for a swarm
of hornets with stinging pens, who, driven from the carcase of petty larceny, must live, and will find a
living {inter alia) by exposing the abuses among their exposers !

They've cut off Junior briefs in Assize Prosecutions and reduced the fees of the ex-leaders. Let them
look to their Treasury, and Mint sohcitorships and snug little legal berths at home and abroad !

They've roused the landlords ! They've raised the ship-owners ! ! They've frenzied the attornies!!!
They've irritated the barristers!!!!

And do they hope to survive themselves, remainder abuses, solitary sinecures, fossil inutilities, idle
appendages of office ? No. Every abuse they destroy, every vested interest they trample down, every
old nuisance they cut away, they bring to life anew and sudden swarm of financial purists. The reformers
will soon be reformed: economising Ministers will be economised: " Low pay for little work." Is that

to be the game ? With Shy lock the
irritated " interests" may hiss out to
Ministers, " If you be like us in all
else, you shall be like us in that. The
economy you teach us we will execute,
and it shall go hard but we will better
the instruction."

THE WRECK OF THE ROYAL
GEORGE.

(After Cowper.)

Toll for a knave!

A knave whose day is o'er !
All sunk—with those who gave

Their cash, till they'd no more !

Shareholders grumbled loud,
Directors wroth did get—

Down went the Royal George,
With all his lines, complete !

Toll for the knave !

The Royal George is gone;
His last account is cook'd;

His work of doing, done !

It was not in the panic,
His credit felt no shock ;

The House at Albert Gate
Stood firm as Albert Rock.

Clerks still drew bated breath,
And moved obedient pen,

When the Royal George went down
Never to float again.

Cast the tottle up,

See how the money goes :

And reckon, railway pup-
-pets, how much England owes.

The Royal George is gone,

His iron rule is o'er—
And he and his Directors

Shall break the lines no more !

THE PUN NEGATIVE.

A Punster quite old enough to
know better, but too old to warrant
the hope that he will not get worse,
has intimated to us the horrible sus-
picion that the present Pope is called
Pio No-no in allusion to his probable
refusal to say yes to any conditions that
may be proposed to him. The vener-
able wag who has insulted us. by this
suggestion has nad the audacity to
add, that, even if Pio No-no should say
" Yes, yes," the joke (!) would still hold,
for No-no might then be construed as
the double negative, which is equal to
one affirmative. We can only say at
present, that we have it in contem-
plation to place the whole _ of the
documents connected with this affair
in the hands of the Lunacy Commis-
sioners, with the view to an inquiry as
to the state of mind of the venerable
wag, who has for some time evinced
the same alarming symptoms that have
at last urged us to this extreme mea-
sure. We wish some benevolent indi-
viduals wouldfound asortof Agapunnery
on the principle of the Agapemone, re-
cently before the public, and we shall
be happy to pay any reasonable sum
of money for the reception of the
venerable wag into such an estab-
lishment.