Punch: Punch (76.1879)

I 174 _PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI_[April 19,, 1879,

AT MADAME ALDEGOND'S (REGENT STREET).

First Dressmaker. "Do tott—a—wear Chamois Leather Underclothing ? "
New Customer. " No ; certainly not."

First Dressmaker. "Oh ! then pray take a Seat, and I will send the Second Dressmaker !"

POOR PELL AH!

Poor patient victim of a grinding yoke!

Mirth at thy piteous plight repents its joke.

Since Israel's children in the self-same land,

Under the harsh taskmaster's heavy hand,

Toiled, groaning at their toil in dumb despair,

What human beast such burden ever bare,

With limbs so weak, and sinews so relaxed,

By ruffians tortured and by rogues o'ertaxed ?—

O'erladen ever, whatsoever shift

Of rulers promises the load to lift.

The Turk long tortured thee; now East and West,

In cold co-partnership of interest,

Combine to crush thee with a double load.

Promise to spare the burden or the goad

Avails thee little yet, that hopest in vain

Mercy from Mammon, help from false chicane.

Pashas and politicians counterscheme,

Bondholders beg, and wily statesmen dream,

Spouters declaim, philanthropists denounce,

But is thy burden lightened by an ounce ?

Tbe lure, the lash, have they not both one end ?

The bait, the bastinado, both but tend

To the same issue of more toil for thee.

But there are Englishmen who blush to see

Britons, in name, mixed with the motley league

Of grasping greed, and infamous intrigue.

Without firm footing on the side of right,

Or power unshackled, with shrewd wrong to fight,

John Bull's befogged; he knows not how he stands,

Mixed with the peddling plots of far-off lands,

like Gulliver, with myriad threads ensnared,

Reaching all ways, yet ever unprepared.

'Tisnot his function freedom to oppose,

Or to strike hands with that poor Fellah's foes,—

Aid arch-rogue Ismael in his ruthless rule,
Or, duped by him, play the check-mated fool,
Bound in an unsought quarrel to appear,
Or to throw up the oards in shame or fear.
And yet, entrapped in Policy's sly maze,
Half-blinded by Imperialism's craze,
He knows not, hour from hour, what hated part
May be prepared for him by statecraft's art,
But loses hold on all his high.traditions,
Prey to a policy of false positions.

A WORD TO THE CRAFT.

Among the candidates for one of the annuities in the gift of the
Freemasons, under his own obscurer name of Richard Henry
Marsh, is Mr. Henry Marston, so well-known to all London play-
goers of a few years ago, as one of the leading actors in the company
of Samuel Phelps, during the palmy days of Sadler's AVells Theatre.
In age and poverty, disabled by rheumatism from following his
profession, and with a wife and daughter dependent on him, he now
seeks the aid of that Masonic oharity which never fails the deserving.
Punch has been asked, as one of the perpetual Orand Masters of the
Order, to urge the case on the attention of the brethren, and does so
with hearty good-will, in the name of good work well done, for
many" a year, in the cause of good Stage-Art, in one of its worthiest
and bravest enterprises.

Not so Easy.

One of the ceremonies at the consecration of a new Prince of the
Church, is that known as " opening and shutting the Cardinal's
mouth." In Cardinal Newman's case, the Pope won't find it so easy
to perform the latter operation. If he opens his mouth, he will do it
to good purpose; and. if he shuts it, it will be, not at any third
party's bidding, but because he sees no good reason for opening it.