Punch (18.1850)

220

PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI.

THI GREATEST BRITISH
SUBJECT.

The Archbishop of Canterbury
has generally been considered to be
the first person under the Crown, and,
next him, the Lord Chancellor.
This is quife a mistake. There is a
yet greater subject than Dr. Sumner
or Lord Cottenham. Not Punch.
Not Prince Albert. Oh ! no. Nor
yet the Duke of Wellington. No ;
nor Sir Robert Peel, nor Lord John
Russell, nor even Lord Brougham,
whatever opinion the latter may have of
Mm self. Not one of the distinguished
personages just mentioned—not the
highest and most influential oi Spanish
bondholders, or of the creditors of
American repudiators—has ever had
a Foreign Secretary for his sheriff, to
issue a writ for him, and a British
Admiral for a bailiff, to collect his
debts. Our late proceedings against
Greece indisputably show that the
greatest British subject is, beyond all
peradventure,—Don Pacifico !

The Tax-Bound Pocket.

We are afraid that Prince Albert's
very laudable project for the Exhibi-
tion of '51 will not meet with all the
encouragement which it so much de-
serves. It is hardly so general a subject
of conversation as we expected is would
be ; and on asking why this is, we are
generally met with the reply:—As to
the Exhibition of the Industry of all
Nations, let, us have the Income-

THE DERBY DAY

lax. taken on, and then we u iam
The stupid Old Couple who cross the Course as the Race begins. about it.

TAO-KWANG'S DRAGON.

Upon the 14th of the First Moon, His Majesty Tao-Kwang (the Lustre of
Reason) departed upon the great journey, mounting upwards on the Dragon, to be a
guest on nigh.—Chinese Court Bulletin.

With a few curious English, it may be a matter of passing curiosity
to know something of the Dragon, which the Emperor of China has
so recently bestrode—taking his Throne as a mounting-post—and de-
parting from Pekin to be a guest in Heaven. We are enabled to give
the fullest particulars of the animal, as set forth by a very distinguished
Bonze in a_ conversation, philosophic and confidential, with an English
Post-Captain, now at Hong-Kong.

Captain. And you really believe that Tao-Kwang started upon a
Dragon ?

Bonze. Believe ! Have not the Flowery People put on garments of
white ? Have not the Mandarins put away their buttons F Do they
not_ let their beards grow, and are not their eye-brows ragged, and
their tails in a state of frenzy ? Believe !

Captain. Aye, aye ; very good. All that we can see. But the
Dragon ? Are you so sure of the Dragon ?

Bonze. Sure of the Dragon! But the barbarians are blind and pig-
skinned ! Sure of the Dragon !

Captain. Understand me. Are you as certain of the existence of the
Dragon as of yonder peacock P Is the Dragon a real thing, or only a
Dragon drawn by the vermilion pencil?

Bonze. The barbarians are eyeless as stones. The Dragon a real
thing! Does not; the Dragon, at certain seasons, with open jaws
approach the moon P Then, do we not beat drums, and strike gongs,
and frighten and appease the Dragon? This do the Bonzes. And
Mien the moon comes forth bright and unbitten ; with not a mark of
the Dragon's tooth in her silver face.

Captain. And is this Dragon—the Dragon of the Eclipse—the same
Dragon that has given old Tao-Kwang a lift aloft?

Bonze. The same.

Captain Who has seen him ? Nobody but the priests ?
Bonze. Nobody but the Bonzes, whose trade it is to see the Dragon
—none other.

Captain. Then you can tell me all about him. What does he
measure from the snout to the tail ? Does he wear chain-armour, or
scale ? Come, paint me your Dragon.

Bonze. The Dragon is as no other Dragon. A Dragon ten palm-
trees in length, and four in compass. A Dragon, coloured as the rain-
bow, with precious stones that melt into one another. A Dragon,
whose teeth are of onyx, whose tongue is of coral, and whose voice is
as the beating of a world of gongs. The Dragon has eyes of orange-
tawney, and on his lower lip is one long hair of mouse-colour, a hair
thick and straightforth as a bulrush.

Captain. You have seen it ?

Bonze. I am a Bonze, and so being, is it not my trade to see and
know, even to a hair, all about the Dragon P Can you turn my
"Yes "inside out into "No"?

The Post-Captain was taken aback by the confidence of the Bonze,
who continued to talk of the Dragon as of a daily friend—an old, old
acquaintance ; making large profit of the knowledge. The Post-
Captain would fain have disputed the matter; but he had a touch of
philosophy (nourished, perhaps, at Exeter Hall), and knew it was a
service of peril to meddle with the property of Bonzes, a property
vested—in Dragons.

Police Libraries.

Evert Police-Office has a Library attached to it. The following,
we believe, are a few of the works generally selected to adorn the
shelv

es:—

Cook's Voyages.
Walker's Exercises.
Strutt's Sports and Pastimes.
A Life of Knox.
The Heads of the People.
The Lost Senses.
Rambles in Berlin.
Impressions of Greece.

Kitchener's Oracle.
Blucher's Campaigns.
Recollections of Eton.
Larder's Encyclopaedia.
The Whole Duty of Man.
Constable's Miscellany.
Lover's Entertainmenta.
Cook's Journal, &c.

Together with the Idler, Tatler, Rambler, and the complete works dt
Borrow, Steele, Bacon, Hogg, and Lamb.