Punch (94.1888)

February 25, 1888.] PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI. _®*

PUNCH TO JOSEPH.
{Air—Obvious.)

Joe Chamberlain, my Joe, Sir,
When first away you went,

Loud croaked the party raven,
With sinister content.

But now the dead-lock's oyer—
At least you tell us so—

Rads—well, they hardly bless you
now,

Joe Chamberlain", my Joe !

Joe Chamberlain, my Joe, Sir,

We yet may meet rough weather ;
The question is, I fear, J oe,

Not settled altogether.
But Canada and John, Joe,

Friends, hand in hand, should go.
Fix that, /'ll bless you anyhow,

Joe Chamberlain, my Joe.

Mem. eor " The Church and
Stage Guild."—Should a Temple of
the Drama be erected in London, the
Bev. Stewart Headlam, who has
always taken so kindly an interest in
the Stage, ought to be elected as one of
the Minor Canons of Dramatic Art.

Appropriate. — When there's
another change, let Mr. Sexton be
member for Bury.

OUR BOOKING-OFFICE.

The Sixth and last volume of Lady Burton's luxuriously bound
1.1a; £ t Rand's Arabian Nights, prepared for household
Jtj?™* McCarthy, M.P., has now appeared. Sir Rich-
ard s edition is the "Strong Burton" not for household consump-
tion; while the Lady Isabel's is "Burton drawn mild," pure in

Chamber;

^^rty and clear as unclouded amber. The "Terminal Essay,"
wbich being unadulterated Burton treble, or rather Basso-profondo,
must have made My Lady shudder and Justin McCarthy clear his
glass, is especially interesting, discussing as it does the date and
°«ei? tlle Tales, and giving a panegyric on Al-Islam which will
anord Canon Isaac-Taylor—the ecclesiastical Sartor Resartus—
orientally inclined, some considerable insight into Mohammedanism,
Which may be of use to him at the next English Church Congress.

K Cardinal Manning will be pleased to find that Mohammed,
pesides abolishing the use of wine and denouncing gambling, was
the first to establish a poor-rate."

In the Second Volume of the Henry Irving Shakespeare, Mr.
-»JUnk Marshall has "warbled his foot-notes," not "wild," and
certainly not " tame," but carefully considered, and most welcome
?? tne critical student and to the uninstructed casual reader. Of
wiese notes I prefer those on the historical plays in this volume to
t tut6 011 ^ne Comedies, among which latter is to be reckoned, according
w Mr. Frank Marshall—who is always m»st frank— The Taming

of the Shrew, a work that in the opinion of "F. M. the Duke," is
not " an outrageous farce." Isn't it ? Read the " business " of the
scene, and then imagine all that must be done on the stage besides
what is set down. In action it is a rough-and-tumble farce, which
no doubt a considerable portion of a sixteenth century audience,
accustomed to bear-fights and brutalities, were quite capable of
appreciating,

" F. M.", terms the repartee between Petruchio and Kate, Act ii.
Sc. 1, " bright and lively." Well, perhaps it was so considered in
Shakspearian and Jonsonian (not Johnsonian)
days, when punning was a fashion; but at
the present time such word-playing would
be as dull to a nineteenth century audience
as would be the horse-play, except when in-
troduced in its legitimate place, a pantomime.
As a comment on Mr. Marshall's opinion,
two-thirds of the lines in this scene are
marked (in this edition) as to be advan-
tageously omitted in representation. The
play is farcical, with the exception of
Katherine's speech in the last Act; but
perhaps it was altogether quite up to the
mark of the enlightened audience for whom
it was intended, namely, Sly the Cobbler, Balancing his book,
who drops off to sleep during the very first

scene, wakes up once, and is then " in the arms of Porpus " till the
conclusion of the play, when he is supposed to be taken away and
put to bed.

Mr. Gordon Browne s illustrations have the great merit of
being dramatic, and untheatrical. The Dance of Clowns in the
Midsummer Night's Dream is conceived in a truly humorous
spirit. F. M.'s notes to Richard the Second—& play full of
strikingly beautiful passages—are excellent, especially the one on
the awfully tragic scene of the death of Cardinal Beaufort, who, as
a matter of historical fact, made a truly Christian end. But genius
is above history, and such stubborn things as facts must be kicked
out of the way for genius to have its true course. If Shakspeake
had sacrificed a grand dramatic effect to plain unadorned truth, the
world would have been deprived of this great scene in Richard the
Second. Once more our congratulations to the Frankest of Frank
Makshalls for Volume Two. " We're a getting on," quoth, still
at your service, The Baron de Book Wobms.

Purely Professional.—After an optical examination by Mr.
Anderson Ceitchett, who is Mr. Punch's own " Member for Eye,"
a military patient was encountered in the street by a merry friend,
who asked what " the Critchett on the hearth " had said to make
him look so cheerful. The Colonel replied, "My boy, he simply
said, ' Eyes Right I' Marchons! "