Punch (71.1876)

r

72

PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI.

[August 19, 1876.

SANCTA SIMPLICITAS.

Mrs. Golightly (fishing for a compliment). "Ah! Mr. McJoseph, Beauty is the most precious of all Gifts for a Woman I
I'd sooner possess Beauty than anything in the "World ! "

Mr. McJoseph (tinder the impression that he is making himself very agreeable). " I'm sure, Mrs. Golightly, that any Regret you

may possibly feel on that score must be amply compensated for by—ee—the consciousness of your moral worth, you
know,-and of your various mental accomplishments ! "

BY THE SAD SEA WAVE.

( Very Like a JVail.)

Time—Sunday, Aug. 6. Scene—The Seacoast at Sunrise.
Interlocutors, Father Neptune and Mr. Punch.

Pnneh. Good morrow, Father Neptune !
| Neptune (gloomily). To my sorrow,

Can't say that I expect a good to-morrow.
Punch. How's that ?
Neptune. Bank Holiday!

Punch. Ho ! ho ! You funk

St. Lubbock's lambs ?
Neptune (saltly). I do, when they are drunk,

Or low, or noisy, or too multitudinous.
Punch. Humph! We 're your nurslings, so there's something rude
in us.

But we all love Old Nep !
| Neptune (ironically). Ay ! once a year,

With passion tempered well by Cockney fear.
Love ? Call you " love " the penchant of tbe rabble
Fired by their yearly craze to come and dabble
Their town toes in my sandy fringe of waves,
While I'm asleep ?
Punch (archly). Why, many a nymph who laves

In your much-honoured flood her fairy feet is
Worthy compare with silver-ankled Thetis ;
While many a dandy lounger on your sand
Could play the Viking did the hour demand.
Old Grampus, you are grumpy!
Neptune (moodily). Well, I'm blunt.

Perhaps I have my reasons. Ask Ward Hunt !
Punch. Or Matthew Were ?

Neptune (mollified). One of the good old breed !

But to be made a toy of is indeed

A thing that irks me. Cockneydom en masse

Is on its way upon my skirts to pass

Some weary weeks of modish monotone,

Or whet its appetite on my ozone.

Can't bid it Come unto these yellow sands."

Sham Sailors, Niggers, Shrimps, and German Bands,

Would vulgarise Atlantis.
Punch. Nay, restrain

Your wrath, great Sire of Floods, and smoothe that " mane "

Which Byron-

Neptune (exploding). Bother Byron ! Heard him quoted

By spooning pairs, who lounged, or strolled, or boated,

Until his lines are stale as Cockney slang,

Or the cork-blackened Minstrel's banjo-twang ;

And for my " mane "—Cits and their Cockney Muse

Would put it into curl-papers!
Punch. You use

Warm words, my Neptune, and your tropes are striking,

But every Villa-dweller's not a Viking.

Can't quite expect you, in a mood thus irate,

To weigh the Cockney fairly 'gainst the pirate-

Neptune (indignantly). Pirate be-

Punch (warningly). Hush! here comes a Nereid,

bent

On wooing your embrace.
Neptune (eyeing her approvingly). Well, I'm content.

Doris might own her for a daughter true.

Were all like her, or—may I say—like you.
Punch (smiling superior). Utopian dreamer! Such wild thoughts

are vain

Till advent of some new Saturnian reign.
A world of Punches and of Peris ! !! _
Neptune. Well,—

Could but the throng3 who yearly come to dwell
Some weeks beside my sweeps of freshening brine,
Contrive to fit their modes and moods to mine