Punch: Punch (54.1868)

February 22, 1868.] PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI.

PROOF POSITIVE.

Mistress. “Your Character is Satisfactory, but I’m very particular about one thing: I wish my Servants to have

PLENTY, BUT I DON’T ALLOW ANY WASTE.”

Page. “Oh, no, ’M, which I’d Eat and Drink till I Busted, ’M, rather than Waste anythink, ’M! !”

A SPEECH-GAUGE EOR ST. STEPHENS.

Some journal lately stated tliat a sixteen-minute sand-glass, which
the writer called a “ Sermon gauge,” had been royally presented to
some pulpit near the Strand. The report was contradicted, and some
heathens were believed to have felt sad for half a second at hearing that
the tale was thought to be untrue.

Punch rarely condescends to borrow an idea, but no mere charge of
plagiary shall stop him from suggesting, now that Parliament has met,
that a Speech Gauge would be really an immense boon in St. Stephen’s.
Whether Members would submit to a sixteen minute limit, may be open
to some question; but there cannot be a doubt that their reporters
would rejoice if that restriction were enforced. What prosiness, what
platitudes would they happily escape, if the longest-winded speakers
were but given sixteen minutes ! Perhaps, by some nice mechanism,
the sand, when ending each four minutes, might be made to sound a
gong, in order that the orator might time his periods aptly, and allow
himself at intervals a moment for reflection. It would be terribly pro-
voking to find one’s time was up before one had blazed off all the fire-
works one had been so long preparing, and orators would doubtless
rehearse their speeches well beforehand, to ascertain exactly the precise
amount of time each point in them would take.

Anybody who knows anything about political debates is, doubtless,
thoroughly aware that few speeches are delivered in an hour and a half
which might not quite as well be made in sixteen minutes. Were a
speech-gauge to be sanctioned, of the limit here suggested, it would
certainly teach speakers to think before they speak, a feat which very
many of them have probably been hitherto too lazy to attempt. In
speaking, as in writing, it is easier to be prolix than pithy and concise.
As somebody says somewhere,—

for making pregnant sixteen-minute speeches, which would stand a
better chance of being listened to attentively, and faithfully reported,
than wearisome, long-winded, empty hour-and-half harangues. With
a speech-gauge in the House, what a saving there would be in the time
spent in legislation! How short would be the Sessions, and how small
the waste of paper in the publishing of Hansard, compared with what
has hitherto been squandered on debates 1 How rare would, be the
midnight sittings of the House, and to what improvement in its ways
would this conduce ! Instead of loitering about, and smoking till the
small hours, with the dissolute excuse of expecting a division, Members
would be able to get home by ten o’clock, and would be in time to take
their wives into society, or to civilise themselves by going with them
to the Opera, or by spending a domestic quiet evening at home. At
present Parliament too often is regarded as a club, and Members, on
the plea of being “wanted at the House,” are led into all sorts of
selfish dissipations, while their wives think them engaged in settling
national affairs. If short speeches were the rule, short sittings would
be usual; and Members would no longer have excuses for late hours.
For domestic reasons, therefore, a speech-gauge would be really quite
a godsend to the House, and, if certain “ persons ” were allowed to
give their votes, the ways and means of getting one would speedily be
granted.

Midnight legislation is seldom beneficial, and if, by setting up a
sixteen-minute speech-gauge, the Commons should be led to give
up their late hours, it would clearly be a proof that they possess some
Commons’ sense. '

attractive motto for the shoeblack’s box.
“ Bright be the place of thy sole.”


“ Words are like leaves, and, where they most abound,

Much fruit of sense beneath is rarely found.”

Were orators to study “ Punch’s Essence of Parliament ” they
might learn a useful lesson in the art of condensation, and fit themselves

What no Man would Like to do.—Acknowledge that his tailor
lived in Tooley Street. _

The Wind to Please the Pigs.—Sow-sow-west.