Punch: Punch (32.1857)

162

PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI.

CRITICS AND TAILORS.

ritic sometimes makes a
reputation for others, and
yet cannot succeed in
making one for himself;
in the same way that there
are Tailors, who can dress
others to look like gentle-
men, and yet fail most sig-
nally the moment they at-
tempt to assume the
appearance of one them-
selves. The style of the
Tailor always will peep out!

JANUS TYPE.

§ It seems that a Trench
I printer has invented a new
5. kind of type, that has a
' letter at each end. The
21 consequence of this con-
venience is, that this
double - faced type does
double duty; for, put into
"^^§^^^>/ III ' \ (Pc a machine constructed for
' i ' 1 the purpose, it prints two

copies instead of one. We
are not vet informed whether the compositors receive double wages,
or at what rate the printers themselves are to be paid for printing,
according to this new form, en partie double! It is a two-fold idea,
that ought to have emanated from the Dublin press, and, besides
saving time and labour, will present admirable advantages to such
conscientious political writers as, fond of playing with a question,
are in the habit of writing on both sides.

MARY ANN'S NOTIONS.

" My dear Mr. Punch,

" I suppose you thought that you would frighten me dread-
fully by that piece of nonsense you stuck to the end of my last letter;
but, if you did, you deceived yourself most exceedingly. You know
nothing at all in the world about what you pretended to say you would
tell, and if you did, which is impossible, because there is nothing of
the kind, and is it likely now that if there was I would put anything
about it in my letters to you to be printed for all the world and his wife
to see ?—but if there was, you are much too dear an old darling to
make mischief. Are you not ? 1

" I want to write to you upon a- very serious subject. I give my
general support (as Papa says) to Lord Paemerston,2 but I suppose
that he, like everybody else,3 is liable to make mistakes sometimes,
and besides I dare say if the truth were known he has nothing at all
to do with it, but it is some stupid clerk in the Government offices
(they all look idiots4) who has taken upon himself to do it.5 At
Lord Palmerston's time of life, though I must say he looks five and
twenty years younger, but then he don't smoke—SMOKE ! (big letters
please6), he cannot be expected to attend to everything. But I mean
about making bishops. The moment a Clergyman has established a
reputation, and filled his Church quite full, and gained the hearts of
Ins congregation, t hey take him away, and make him a bishop, and we
see and hear no more of him. This has happened twice within the
last year or so to my knowledge. I need not mention names, and I
thinfe that it, is time the custom should be stopped.

"It stands to reason, my dearer. Punch. What on earth is the
use of a bishop ? I don't mean that, you know, but what has a bishop
to do that any stupid country curate could not do ?7 He comes and
preaches a charity sermon now and then, and it is a remarkable thing
how very bad those charity sermons are,8 and I don't wonder they
draw so little money. The Dissenters manage much better; they send
the plates round from pew to pew in the hands of deacons and people
that personally know everybody in the chapel, and can see whether
they don't give, and can say next day, 'How mean dearly beloved
sister Brown gets with her worldly goods—she only gave us sixpence
For our dear missionaries,' and so the screw is put on (as Augustus
would say), but I was speaking of a bishop. He has to do confirma-
tions ; and if he had to catechise the young ladies it would be another
matter (our curate was so modest that when we came in class he used
to sit on the corner of his table with his back to us, and ask us over
his shoulder what was our duty to our neighbour),9 but this is all done
ready to the bishop's hand. Consecrating churches, too, but that is a

form. Then you will say there is the House of Lords, but if you
think that a minister of religion ought to be making speeches, and
crying hear, hear, and coughing down honourable Members and all
that, I don't; besides, if you want that sort of thing, there are plenty
of noisy quarrelsome clergymen who are always getting into riots with
their flocks, and you might make them bishops, and let them expend
their fury upon politics.10

" He was a perfectly dear man, one of the clergymen I allude to
whom the Government has made a bishop of. 1 never would go to
church when I did not think he was going to preach.11 Such a gentle-
man, and such a perfect manner, and a lovely voice. It was impossible
not to feel persuaded of the truths of religion when he preached, though
I dare say some glum old stupid man might have said the same words,
but who would go and listen to him, I should like to know ?12 He was
so earnest and affectionate, but all in perfect good taste, and never
forgot that he was a gentleman, and that he was addressing ladies.
Not that he minced matters, my dear soul; far from it; the way he
denounced the wickedness of the lower classes, and cheating trades-
men, and swearing and drunkenness about our streets, wTas quite awful
at times, and I only wish that the people he alluded to had been there
to profit by his exhortations, for I am sure it must have done them
good; and there ought to be galleries built for such persons, where
they can come and be lectured, without coming into contact with
their betters.13 He looked quite like an apostle, and when you
recollect that he was an Honourable, and had been brought up with
every luxury, and I dare say might have been a Prime Minister if he
had liked, to think of his devoting himself to such dull work as
making sermons and looking after a~ parish (not a West-end parish
neither) convinced me that he must be a sincerely good man.14 As
for the women, they were wild after him, and on the days when it was
known that he would preach everybody went, and people had to stand
in the aisles and sit on the pulpit stairs ; and when there has been a
disappointment, and he has not come, I have seen ladies leave the
church after the second lesson. He was a divine creature,15 and I
say again that whoever advises Lord Palmerston to take away such
men and make bishops of them has a great deal to answer for.

" Yours, affectionately,
"Sunday." « Mary Ann."

1 You will see. We are not to be coaxed over. Besides, who is the youug lady
who has called five times to try to see us, would not leave her card, but seemed very
anxious ?

2 He must be very grateful. Perhaps he will give g. H. a situation.

3 Except one person, who is annotating your note.

4 Some of them, and are what they look. But not all.

5 It may be so, but we never heard that the appointment of bishops devolved
upon Government clerks.

6 Big it is. But this is all folly. We smoke.

" Why stupid, Miss ? A country curate, who really does his duty, is to be honoured
as much as any man living.

8 Very true. We cannot tell why. Perhaps a gentleman feels at a disadvantage
in begging shillings, with his thousand guinea equipage at the church door, and
diamond rings on bis fingers.

9 It did the reverend gentleman credit, you giggling things.

10 The hideous ignorance and folly of this sentence defies comment. We print it
as an awful warning of what women can say when permitted pen and ink.

11 More shame for you. The sermon is but an inferior part of the service. But,
evidently, you are utterly iu the dark upon the whole subject.

" Simply disgusting.

13 Idiot.

14 Idiot.

15 Idiot.

TREASON TO THE CHURCIL

The Chartists say that Lord Palmerston's making no new Bishcp
except out of an "Honourable" and Reverend (we have had three
titled hierarchs within a year) gives them hope of his church-reforming
intentions. They believe that he means to expel the Bishops from the
legislature, but desires that they should possess the titles which are
said to give them so much influence in converting the upper classes.
We trust that the aristocratic Evangelists will defeat the insidious
Bottleholder, and henceforth refuse the lawn intended, like the robe
given by Clytemnestra to Agamemnon, for entangling the head upon
which the axe is to fall. Is Peeeam so far on his way to Norwich that
he cannot be recalled in favour of Spliegeon ?

Bits of Sunbeam.

We learn that " sprinkling Gold Dust on the Hair is becoming more
and more in vogue." We hope not; or, to a certainty we shall hear
of Duchesses being waylaid, and—as sovereigns are, _ at times,
Hebraically treated—"sweated" for the precious particles. The
gold-dust "imparts to the hair that shining golden hue which a great
poet has said "— (Tupper, no doubt,)—"' appears as though a sunbeam
had been broken into bits, and scattered among the tresses.' " We
think there must be a little mistake as to the particular luminary,
broken into bits : for with respect to a head given to gold-dust, we
should say it was rather influenced by the moon than the sun.