Punch or The London charivari: Punch or The London charivari (5.1843)

PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI.

87

A FINANCIAL DISCUSSION.

On moving the order of tlie day for going into a committee of supply,
The Chancellor of tiie Exchequer said he should ask a vote for
miscellaneous estimates. These were necessarily large, but the House
would see that if a given sum were inadequate, a further sum could not
be refused ; and as honourable gentlemen on the other side of the House
asked for reductions, lie (the Chancellor of the Exchequer) would not
say that they (the Opposition) acted improperly [hear) ; but this he would
say. that looking at all things together, it might not—nay, he would go
further and say it could not be considered expedient. [Cheers.) Last
year something was said about corn. (Cheers from the Ministerial benches,
and ironical cheers from the Opposition.) Corn was in everybody's mouth,
but now there was a change, and they (the Opposition) had nothing on the
tip of their tongues but sugar. (Laughter.) Well, he (the Chancellor
; of the Exchequer) did not undertake to say—in fact, he was not in a
position to justify his saying it—but he would like to ask gentlemen
opposite, what they would have done with timber, even if they had got rid
: of the sugar embarrassment ? (//ear, hear.) It was true that his honour-
able friend on the other side of the House had been prepared to deal
fiscally with the raw material ; but surely the House must feel—and he
said it without any desire to detract from the well-earned reputation of
another honourable friend, who sat in another part of that House—he
(the Chancellor of the Exchequer) did think that the House must feel
strongly on a point which he (the Chancellor of the Exchequer") from
motives the House, bethought, would appreciate, (Cheers), refrained from
any further dwelling on.

Lord Palmerston was glad to see that the Chancellor of the Exchequer
proposed to look at timber in another light. (No, no, from the Chancellor
of the Exchequer.) Oh then, the honourable gentleman did not mean to
look at it in another light. Then he (Lord Palmerston) would ask the
Chancellor of the Exchequer to define the light in which he did mean to
look at it. (Hear.) There were the Colonies, that wanted your iron, aud
your

pig-lf.ad,

and were thrusting their own sugar down your throats, and you would not
take it, while your Canadian subjects were offering their timber, which
you thrust back upon them till you crushed them with it. (No, from Sir
James Graham.) Well ; but it was so. Look at the East, or even take
the West. (Hear, hear.) The day might come, when the scaffold-poles
of your new buildings should be made of the very timber that now you
refused to have anything to do with. All the great powers were watching
you, and before you have got your exchequer into a flourishing state, you
might find yourselves compelled to ask your enemies for your tea, and
look in vain to your friends for your gruel. (Loud cheers.)

Mr. Hume was very anxious to know what were the views of the
Government as to fruit, and particularly what her Majesty's ministers
meant to do with raspberries ? (Hear.)

The Chancellor of the Exchequer complained of bein^ taken by
surprise.

Colonel Sibthorp would ask Mr. Roebuck whether the influence of the
Tariff had been felt by British asses. (Hear.)

Mr. Roebuck thought the gallant Colonel was the best judge of the
subject. (Laughter.)

Both the honourable members explained, and the estimates were ulti-
mately agreed to.

PRINCE ALBERT AND THE PROROGATION.

It will be seen that Prince Albert, who formerly upon state occasions
sat on a little chair, has had a large one made for him. At the last pro-
rogation, lie was allowed a moderate-sized seat ; but now he is favoured
with one in every respect the same as that prepared for her Majesty.
What has Prince Albert lately done to entitle him to a larger share of
elbow-room than was formerly allowed him 1 The Prince has evidently
been " looking up " ever since his marriage. On his first taking part in
state ceremonies, he used to sit upon footstools, hassocks, or anything he
could get; but he was soon promoted ; and we find him at one of the
levees of last year suddenly elevated to a music-stool. In the course of time,
he was placed on a regular chair ; but it was always lower than that of
the Queen, until the recent case of the prorogation, when "a pair of golden
elbows " were ordered to be made exactly alike fflr the roval couple. We
did not see the little chair for the Prince of Wales ; but we believe it
was fitted up with every comfort for its juvenile occupant, and covered
over with the richest crimson velvet.

KING O'CONNELL'S INTENDED HOUSEHOLD.

Supposing the present agitation in Ireland to end in a repeal of
the Union, and that O'Connell should be proclaimed King, by the
title of Daniel the First, it would be a matter of speculation to con-
sider how he would form liis household. We should imagine the
following list of officers to be as accurate as possible :—

Comptroller of the Rent.

Brazen Face in Ordinary.

Wooden Shillelah in Waiting.

Hereditary Grand Mendicant.

Solicitor-General of Subscriptions.

Ghoom of the Grab.

Keeper of the Privy Purse and Holder of the Hat_
Steward of the Tail.

Clerk of the Kitchen.

Scamps of the Scullery.

Lords of the Wash-house.

Hereditary High Humbug.

A. Week at Ciielsea for One Pound.

A Steam-boat will leave London Bridge on Saturday next, to take a
limited party to Chelsea, who will be landed again in a week at the place
they stalled from. The charge will be only one pound, and the party will
be free to all the amusements of the place, including access (every other
night) to a dry skittle-ground. A guide will be in attendance twice in.
the course of the week to take the party to the Old Bun House and the
other antiquities of the place. The fare during the whole of the term'
will be the very best that can be had (for the money), and the first twenty
subscribers will be entitled to two suppers of oysters in the course of the
week ; the next ten, to one supper of oysters ; and the remainder to one
pound of pickled salmon, to be raffled for. There will be an excursion
once in an omnibus, and everything will be done to keep up an uninter-
rupted round of gaiety.

ST. STEPHEN AND THE GROUSE.

Had tlie biography of St. Stephen been properly penned, we
should have had a thousand anecdotes in proof of his devotion to
grouse. It is true that in the times of St. Stephen (long ere lie
took an English Parliament under his nominal protection), fowling-
pieces were not ; nevertheless St. Stephen, in his young wild days
—for is it not an approved apothegm that the wilder the sinner the
sterner the saint ?—brought down the game with a bow, a long bow :
a weapon, sooth to speak, much used by many nobs of the calendar.
His passion for the sport made him forgetfiri of most important
business. Hence he would away from his house, without deigning
to cast so much as a look upon the Bills that were presented to him ;
Bills in which the interests of thousands and thousands of poor
people were concerned, and which, as a person taking upon himself
the regulation of their affairs, it behoved him to look after. But no
August came ; lie heard—or thought he heard—the grouse call from
the heather ; and St. Stephen cocked his cap at justice, put the end
of his thumb to the tip of his nose (a gesture, according to a paper
read by Lord Lennox last week before the Society of Antiquaries,
as old as the Phoenicians), and was off shooting—or, as the old manu-
script before us lias it,

" B sfjootgnge Imtfje jk loitgc totoc."

From this manuscript—unaccountably overlooked by all the bio-
graphers—we have obtained many disreputable truths illustrative of
the character of St. Stephen. Certainly, these truths prove him
to have been an idler—a hard talker—an expensive, dissipated,,
hypocritical swaggerer. Mind, all this was when he was plain
Stephen, long before he was canonised. Now, of course, he is a.
gentleman of rose-coloured character, and in every way worthy of the-
fine houses that Mr. Barry is building for him !

Well, this manuscript avers that Stephen was sent to bamboozle
the poor folks to choose him as a sage, discreet person, to make rules
and regulations for them, and, indeed, to let him have the fingering
of their pockets. Yes ; the fellow had so oily a tongue, that the
simple, unsuspecting people permitted him to do what lie liked with
their own. And the knave Stephen was such an unscrupulous
varlet, that he would do any antic, eat any dish, tell any lie, to get