Punch (37.1859)

I

September 24, 1859.

PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI.

131

;

SUBSTITUTES FOR MILITARY FLOGGING,

To Colonel North, M.P.

My Dear Colonel,

In proposing “The Army and Navy” the other day, at Ban-
I hnry, yon are reported to have told the farmers that—

“ The punishment of flogging for desertion in the Army had only been lately
sanctioned by Parliament in the Mutiny Act, and it was absolutely necessary,
because during last year alone there were no less than 11,000 desertions, and it
must be borne in mind that every soldier cost the country for his kit and his bounty
alone £6 18s , independently of which a large expense was incurred in drill.”

Absolutely necessary, my dear Colonel? Will you, on reflection,
adhere to the statement, that flogging is absolutely necessary to prevent
desertion from the Army ? Is the British Army so uncomfortable a
sphere that, but for the terror of thejash, the soldiers would burst
their confines, and break out of it ? Is it, indeed, too hot to hold any
private soldier, undeterred from quitting it by the tormenting scourge
of the military guardian furies ? And is it the fact, that the number of
deserters last year amounted to anything like eleven thousand—
allowance being made for the rascals who re-enlisted to sack a second
bounty ? Can you think of no better means of preventing such whole-
sale desertion than tying up the wretches who are guilty of it and
torturing them ? Apparently not. Bor I find you, in continuation,
making this acknowledgmentWith regard to the punishment of
flogging, he had no hesitation in saying that it was a degrading punish-
ment, but it was intended to be a degrading one. No doubt it was a
severe punishment, and he himself had seen both officers and men
faint while it was being inflicted, and if Mr. Bright, or any other
man, would provide an effectual substitute, he had no doubt the whole
Army would gladly receive it.”

“ Hear, hear,” cried your audience, greeting this last expression of
opinion. I, too, say, hear, hear. Wanted, then, an effectual sub-
stitute for flogging! Can I suggest any ? Certainly not any simply
penal, substitute, at once more effectual and milder. A more effectual
substitute of that kind would be a severer one. You sometimes brand
deserters in addition to flogging them. Well, suppose you branded
them—not by. tattooing, but, more majorim, with a red-hot iron.
The superaddition of branding .to flogging would be more effectual
than mere, flogging. Nose-slitting, ear-cropping, and other the like
good old inflictions, would doubtless produce increased effect of the
same kind. And if you tore a man’s back with red-hot pincers, instead
of knotted cords, you would probably find the pincers an effectual
substitute for the cat-o’-nine-tails.

But must the substitute, to be effectual, be penal ? Must we take
this point for granted? Could desertion be stopped by encouraging
soldiers to. remain in the Army as well as by discouraging them from
deserting it ? I suspect it might. Better permanent pay, the stipu-
lated amount honestly paid in cash, the chance of promotion, and com-
fortable. and decent quarters, would, perhaps,—if the idea of any
alternative for punishment can be entertained,—constitute an efficient
substitute for flogging. Might not one of the causes of desertion, for
example, be removed by remedying, in barracks, that inconvenience
which is similar to the Carrier's grievance in Henry IF.? The cause

ceasing, the effect ceases—would not the abolition of the causes of
desertion, in so far as they can be abolished, prove a substitute for
flogging, effectual in such a measure as at least to render corporal
punishment not absolutely necessary ? The substitute would be ex-
pensive ? It would hardly cost so much, however, after the rate, as a
state of things in which five thousand soldiers are found to jump at an
opportunity of getting discharged from service. . This is not the con-
temptible fancy of a blank civilian, but the opinion of the Prince
Consort’s gallant comrade,

Pield Marshal Punch.

P.S. Recollect, the lash was once thought absolutely necessary in
madhouses, but now its employment has given place to humane treat-
ment, and the substitute has proved effectual.

Ilea cl-Quarters, 85, Fleet Street.

THE LAMENT OE THE WESTMINSTER CLOCK-WORKS.

Oh ! Barry and Denison ne’er shall we get a
Good pair of hands to exhibit our paces,

So long as you two only double your meta-
•Physical fists in each other’s faces.

If Barry would make them so weighty no baro-
-Meter could weigh them,—no barrow could carry ;

As Time will not wait, but flies on like an arrow,

’Tis meeter that we should not wait for Charles Barry.

At Ben Rhydding, Denison seems to be bidding
Eor lightness of hand—as though old Time would linger;

But Big Ben, himself of his Denison ridding,

Still tolls a lament for the loss of his finger.

Each writes to the “ Times," while the time’s flying on:

At each letter the ire of each seems to wax hotter;

Sir Charles gives his deep digs, while warm Denison,

From out his cold sheets, throws Sir Charles in hot-water.

Oh! Barry and Denison, let us alone;

Or put hands to the work—not of writing a letter—

But as both of you have so much face of your own,

Each take to a face; show which does it the better.

Or let some one else, who’s a little less wroth,

Give us hands, that are not only handsome but strong.

While you two—many cooks only spoiling the broth,—

May prove to the world that you’re both in the wrong.

AWEUL WARNING.

In the Bath Chronicle we discover the following appalling para-
graph

“ Caution to Yawners.—On Thursday last, a young man named Diprose, a
servant to Mr. R. Biggenden, Peckham East, was in the act of yawning, when his
jaw became dislocated. By no effort of its own could it bo brought to its original
position, and with his jaw distended he proceeded a distance of two miles to a
surgeon’s, Mr, Hooker, of Hadlow, who replaced it, and no serious consequence
ensued.”

If this is true, no father of a family, unless himself a medical man,
will in future allow Sir Archibald Alison’s History of Europe to
remain in his house. To be sure, the appalling catalogue of Sir A. A.’s
blunders, set out by a merciless torturer in Eraser’s Magazine, must
deter any humane Paterfamilias from leaving the ton or so of
mistakes termed a History within reach of young people. Still, how-
ever, the fate of Mr. Diprose should be known in domestic circles.

THE TOBACCO-PIPE OP JOHN SOBIESKY.

“ The tobacco-pipe out of which Johann Sobiesky smoked during the siege of
Vienna, and which had been carried away by the French about fifty years ago, his
lately been sent back to Vienna, and re-instituted to its former place and honours.”

The relic may well be cherished, but hardly, perhaps, by the govern-
ment which, after being saved from the Turks, by the gallant King of
Poland, took part in two successive partitions of his kingdom, and
finally joined in the suppression of the liberties of Cracow,—the very
city in which the Polish monarch gathered the army which rescued
Vienna from the Mussulman. The. whiff of Sobiesky’s pipe is the
most fitting emblem of Austrian gratitude; but one would hardly think
that Austria would like to remind people that her professions of thank-
fulness to the Polish hero expired m smoke.

Of no use to any but the Owner.—A Black Eye.