Punch: Punch (6.1844)

PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI.

4 3

CHAPTER THE TENTH.—OF THE PEOPLE. WHETHER ALIENS
DENIZENS, OR NATIVES.

; Spencers led to the introduction of spencers with no tail at all, several
' centuries afterwards.

THE COMIC BLACKSTONE. j Natural born subjects have rights that nothing but their own misbe-

haviour can forfeit; such as the right of buying lands, if they have got the
money to pay for them.

This glorious privilege may be enjoyed by the meanest subject, under
the circumstances last alluded to.

An alien may purchase lands ; but if he does, the Sovereign is entitled
to them. Nevertheless, an alien may hire a house to live in, though the
King of the Belgians, when he first came to London as an alien, occupied
only lodgings, being those on the second floor of Hagger's oil and pickle
shop in Oxford street. The Prince, who is now the Lord of the Belgians
and their soil, was then the vassal of Hagger, to whom he did weekly
homage to the tune of thirty shillings.

An alien may trade freely; so that Verrey dispenses dinners in strict
conformity with the provisions of our glorious Constitution.

Children born out of England, whose father or grandfather, by the
father's side, is in allegiance to the English Sovereign, are natural born
subjects ; and therefore the summer visitors to.Boulogne are in no danger
of producing a crop of young aliens,—a result which would deprive the
Sovereign of many subjects, and not only the Sovereign, but the Emerald,
the Sir William Wallace, the Grand Turk, and the Waterwitch, of a
great number of passengers.

The children of aliens, when born in England, are considered as natural
born, and Pagliano's Hotel contributes annually a large stock of subjects
to the British monarchy.

A denizen is an alien, who, by the Royal prerogative, is made a natural
—being, in fact, an animal something like a mule, which, being between
the horse and the ass, generally partakes mostly of the latter. The
denizen is indeed almost, not quite, a natural.

Naturalisation can only be achieved by Act of Parliament; but even
when naturalised, neither an alien nor a denizen can be a member of
Parliament,—a dignity that naturals only are thought worthy of.

There have been one or two attempts to introduce an Act for the
general naturalisation of all foreigners; but the nearest approach to it is
the statute naturalising certain persons who have served two years in the
army or navy, and some who have been three years fishing for whales ;
which really exhibits such a strong turn for natural history, that naturalis-
ation is the smallest compliment which can be paid to it.

aving treated of the Sovereign, we now come
down to the small change, or in other words,
we turn from her Most Gracious Majesty the
Queen, to his Most Miscellaneous Majesty
the people.

The people are divided into aliens and
natural born, though the latter are not neces-
sarily born naturals. Natural born subjects
are such as are born within the ligeance, or
allegiance of the Sovereign—but aliens are
such as are born out of it.

Allegiance is the tie which binds the subject
to the Sovereign, and the form is derived
from the Goths ; who, under the feudal system, held their possessions
under some lord, to whom they were vassals. The only remains of
this system are to be met with at the Gothic Cottages in the Regent's
Park, the tenants of which swear fealty every quarter to the lord or
his house agent. Formerly there was mutual trust between the tenant
of the soil and the owner, but this trust has been much broken in upon,
by the modern practice of ".shooting the moon," which hath destroyed
that sylvan state of simple confidence which formerly existed.

The vassal was formerly expected to defend the lord against his
enemies ; so that if the landlord of a house got into a street row, his
vassals or lodgers were expected to take part in it. This was called
fidelilas or fealty, the tenant taking an oath to protect the lord of the
-soil ; but this is now commuted into an undertaking to pay the taxes,
including a police rate, which secures the lord and the vassal also from
violence. The oath of allegiance to the Sovereign is still taken by attor-
neys and barristers, on being admitted to practise ; but in consequence of
their number, it has been arranged as a solo and chorus for the officer of
the Court, and an unlimited number of voices, which chime in together,
expressing their horror of the Pope—without knowing who the old
gentleman is—and declaring that it is not lawful to murder foreign
princes in the public street—as if any one in these
days ever thought of assassinating continental
royalty in Regent-street, or any of the leading
thoroughfares.

It seems, however, that all subjects owe alle-
giance to the Sovereign, whether they have taken
the oath or not ; and it is very probable that the
ideas of most people would be much the same on the
slaughter of foreign princes, without going through
the ceremony of swearing the awful affidavit
alluded to.

Every person born within the English dominions
owes allegiance to the Sovereign from the moment
of birth, being at once under the protection or
particular patronage of royalty. The immense
quantity of allegiance payable from persons of large
families may therefore be conceived ; and it must
be held as a constitutional doctrine, that twins
cause a double accession of loyalty. Local allegiance
is something of the nature of portable gas, for it is
moveable, and only lighted up in the bosoms of aliens
during their residence in this country, after which
it may be turned off, or otherwise extinguished.

It seems that allegiance is as much due to the
usurper as to the rightful Sovereign, and must be
paid to whomsoever is on the throne for the time
being. If, therefore, a lunatic should get into the
throne room in the Palace, and, sitting on the
throne, proclaim himself king, it would seem that
the royal housemaid would owe temporary alle-
giance to the madman, until a policeman should
regularly dethrone him, and walk the usurper off
to the nearest—that is to say, a much more humble
—station.

Allegiance is due to the person, and not to the
dignity alone ; for, in the time of Edward the
Third, the Spencers were banished for refusing allegiance to the person
of the King, and offering it to his crown, which was something like the
notion of bowing to Gesler's hat, which, through Sheridan Knowles's
■* William Tell," every one is acquainted with. The sad tale of these

So much for " the People," who have always got a number of * People's
Friends" ready to serve them in all sorts of ways ; but serving them out
is the most usual course that is taken.

Post Office Intelligence,

Government having contracted for a mail to Sydney once a month,
all letters for that quarter must be marked " Overland, through Sydney's
Alley.*'

Good Grounds for It.

Sinck our report of the « Daring Wager " at Herne Bay, all the back
Numbers of the Morning Post have been purchased by a wealthy Railway
Company, from the fact that the Post makes the soundest tleeperj.