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

PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI.

131

THE QUEEN'S VISIT TO BELGIUM.

We give full credit to the King of the French for the handsome
and liberal manner in which lie entertained our most gracious Queen.
There was plenty to see, and plenty to eat and drink ; there was
cheese without limit, and beer a discretion, or even beyond discretion,
if the suite felt disposed to indulge in it. But how different is the
scale on which everything has been done in Belgium ! At Ghent,
under the pretext of the inhabitants being stubborn burghers, the
preparations were of the shabbiest character. The Governor, Burgher-
master and Bishop of Ghent drew up in a double line to receive her
Majesty !! This miserable show of officials (three drawn up into a
double line,) was all that Ghent could or would muster to do honour
to Queen Victoria. Not an evergreen—not a single laurel in a
miserable green tub—not a twig of ivy twined round a ball of string,
—nothing, in fact, but three officials drawn up, two a-breast, in a
double line, by a process which defies all the skill we possess in the
science of arithmetic.

The report proceeds in a manner still more distressing—" When
the Queen had been handed by King Leopold up the steps of the
receptacle! (which was the same that sheltered the royal party at
Ostend,) the officials approached, and the Burgliermaster invited the
Queen to a cold collation." AVe were very naturally horrified at this
allusion to a receptacle, up the steps of which our own Victoria was
assisted—perhaps pushed—by her royal uncle. This receptacle turns
out, upon inquiry, to have been a sort of extensive sentry-box, to
which the reporters have given the more respectable name of a
Pavilion. We really are indignant at the necessity our Queen seems
placed under, of going about from place to place with a movable
apparatus to sit down in—and "the obstinate burghers of Ghent"
deserve to be well trounced for their obstinate stinginess. At the
Government House they managed to place at the disposal of the
Queen " a very simply furnished suite of two chambers ; " (we quote
the verv words of the report) "situated at the furthest extremity
of the building." A suite of two rooms shabbily furnished—and in the
furthest extremity of the building ! The Queen was then hurried
off—with nothing to eat—to the Cathedral, where she saw a candle-
stick splendidly chiselled, and, as it belonged to Charles the First, it
was from one of our own Sovereigns that the Dutch chiselled it.
The collation appears to have been cold and shabby, partaking rather
of the character of a property banquet at a minor theatre, than a
regular substantial repast. There were a brace of pheasants served
up in their own feathers—from which it may be inferred how much
of them Her Majesty could get to eat; and there were some pullets,
so bedizened with ornamental paper, that there was no knowing
where to get a cut at them. All this rudeness and stinginess in re-
ceiving the Queen is attributed to the "proud and insubordinate
character of the citizens of Ghent"—who certainly, one and all, seem
imbued with much more of the spirit of the Gent, than of the Gen-
tleman. We should think Leopold must be heartily ashamed of his
subjects.

A COLUMN FOR THE SCIENTIFIC.

the new electricity.

Mr. Punch had the honour of receiving, in company with other sciontific
and great characters, an invitation to a private view of the Hydro-electric
Machine last week at the Polytechnic Institution. An account of its
wonderful powers may interest the philosophic world, as it will he found
more correct than any which appeared in the leading journals.

Anxious to conform to the usual regulations of the establishment,
Mr. Punch did not take his bdton with him ; but, upon arriving at the
| Institution, he found that sticks were admitted on that evening. He was
Received in the hall by a deputation of the assistants, who are something
jetween soldiers, railway-guards, and policemen, and was by them ushered
into the theatre of the exhibition.

The appearance of the boiler is somewhat that of a gigantic pantomime
cock-horse ; or rather a maimed locomotive upon wooden legs. Along the
top are ranged several large metal notes of interrogation, which Mr. Punch
ascertained were for asking positive questions as to its success—the elec-
tricity replying in the negative. The fire-place faces the audience, and
will be used, when the machine comes into full action, for supplying baked
potatoes at a cheap rate to the foreign gentlemen who frequent Regent-
street.^ Up to the present time every operation carried on within it has
en ea 111 smoke ; the results having been carried out through the medium
o a telescope chimney. This is attended to by a stoker, poker,—or coker,
according to the new nomenclature,—who was tastefully attired for the
o.eas'on in no coat, a blue shirt, of a fancy pattern, and invisible any-
colour trousers.

At eight o'clock the lecturer received the word to go a-head easy ; and
explained the theory of steam electricity by dropping a live ember into a
tumbler of fluid, until which instant Mr. Punch was not aware of the
scientific interest attached to the common phrase, " A glass of water with
the chill off, and a cinder in it." How intimately are science and sport
connected ! The steam was then let off to generate the electricity ; and
all doubt was at once removed as to the certainty of its making a great
noise in the philosophical circles. The rapid manner in which its action
caused tin to melt and disappear, told rather against its pecuniary success;
but this was counterbalanced by the liberal style in which it came down
with the dust, upon stirring the fire. A chain of pith and cork was then
suspended from the ceiling, and on connecting it with the boiler a series of
bright reports—if we may so term them—were produced. Its effects
were stated to be very powerful—sufficient to knock down a regiment of
men, so that in the event of another

Cesar's invasion,

or of Rebecca coming to London, the Institution could stand any siege, for
which it is fully prepared. Polytechnic reviews, and inspections of the
magazines, would keep its troops in fine order. The batteries, as at pre-
sent, would be under the command of the electrical lecturer ; and the
professor of chemistry would arrange the mortars ; whilst the Daguerro
typist has declared his ability to take anybody off in a minute ; and not
only to take him off, but fix him where he was placed ; and the microscopic
demonstrator would be applied to in dilemmas for his enlarged views upon
any subject.

At the conclusion of the discourse, the lecturer took half-a-turn astern,
and retired amongst the cheers of the spectators. As gastronomy has been
discovered by the British Association to be inseparable from science, a
banquet on a scientific plan next awaited the company. Everything was
conducted in the best spirit of philosophical liberality. Some beautiful
combinations of the animal and vegetable kingdom existed in the form of
lobster-salads ; and the tenacity of animal fibre was exhibited in a fowl
placed opposite to a gentleman who could not carve. The decrease of
volume and evolution of caloric upon mixing alcohol with water was shown
when the grog came upon the table ; and the different degrees of fermen-
tation were demonstrated by the wine and vinegar upon the festive board
—the candles giving the most interesting examples of the oxidation of
matter by combustion.

Altogether it was a most agreeable soiree ; and gave great satisfaction
to all parties. During the evening the following polytechnic toasts were ^
drunk :—

M Water—the source of all legitimate power."

" The tank, the bell, and the boiler."

" May we ne'er want a visitor, nor a slight shock to give him."

" May our animosities dissolve like our views, and our friendship enlarge
like our flea."

u The mental electrotype, which invests all it publishes with gold."

"Suceess to all lectures, except curtain lectures," &c., &c., &c., &c., &c.

INSULT TO THE NATIONAL ANTHEM.

We have heard a good deal about insults to British and other flags,
but we hold to the belief that the National bunting is not so sacred as the
National Anthem. "Perfidious Belgium" has desecrated "God Save
the Queen" by turning it into a waltz ; and instead of an outburst of
enthusiasm at the line " Confound their politics," the waltzer is supposed
to execute a pirouette, which is supposed to hit at our wavering propen-
sities. Where was Lord Aberdeen while this dreadful desecration was
going on ? Perhaps waltzing to the very music through which the insult
was conveyed to our country. To think that in the very dominions where
England immortalised her name, in the actual neighbourhood of Waterloo,
our National Anthem—which is so venerable that nobody knows who
composed it—should have been made the pastime of an idle hour, for
a few hundred Belgians to kick their heels to. If our British newspaper
writers bore the smallest resemblance to those of France, we should have
a casus belli in no time. But alas ! there is no patriotism in the English
press, and we shall still continue to hear in the royal speeches of
" friendly relations " with perfidious Belgium. Friendly relations with a
people who have turned " God Save the Queen " into a waltz ! The idea
is degrading.