Punch (9.1845)

1G

TOO GOOD TO BE TRUE.

We have been frequently and urgently pressed to adopt the admirable examples of our
fascinating prottqe Jemkins, and devote, from time to time, a column to what he so aptly
styles « Table Talk."

The convenient position of our box at the Opera, known as the Punch omnibus, will
enable us, in our own proper persoD, to pick up the chit-chat of the week on Saturday
nights; and as we are always too happy to receive between the acts, and during the ballet,
our multitudinous friends, including Brougham and Sibthorp, we shall probably learn more
of even legislative news, than we can glean from the cumbrous reports of the morning
papers.

Our prime favourite the Ex-Chancellor amused us, on Saturday last, with an account of

a bill which he had introduced to the House of Lords
some time back, for the express purpose of " Securing
the Real Independence of Parliament." The very idea
of the thing made us laugh so as nearly to split our
hump, for there is nothing more calculated to give
intense piquancy to a joke, than gravity and command
of countenance in the telling it. We were sceptical,
and sent our boy Dick, the first thing on Monday, for
a copy of the bill ; aDd the preamble, we find, seriously
contains the following words :—

"And whereas, Persons should no longer he suffered to assist
in making the Laws which they continually do violate: Beit
therefore enacted by the Queen's most Excellent Majesty, by and
with the Advice and Consent of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal,
and Commons, in this present Parliament assembled, and by the
Authority of the same, That from and after the passing of this
Act if any Judgment shall be given against any Peer or any
-Member of the Commons House, for any Debt, and it shall be
found that such Peer or Member hath not paid the Money into
Court, or that the Debt shall remain unpaid, then and in that
Case such Peer or Member shall be altogether incapable of
sitting and voting in either House of Parliament, unless within
Twelve Calendar Months from the Process being issued against
him he shall pay the Debt."

When the bill is sent down to the Commons, it is
intended to give a more extended effect to the great
principle involved in it. An entire purification of
both Houses will be proposed, and no person will
be allowed to make laws who is in the habit of vio-
lating them ; not only bankrupts, but adulterers,
dicers, duellists, sabbath breakers, all who swear and
get drunk, and talk scandal; those who smuggle cigars
or Eau de Cologne ; every man who underrates his
income to the commissioners, or ventures to the
Queen's costume ball, without paying the tax on
hair-powder,—all, all will be chasse'd, and we shall
at length have a Parliament after our own heart.
Go it, Brougham, we devoutly say, and more strength
to your elbows !

MOST NOBLE FESTIVITIES.

hen the first part of Lady j for eccentricity of grammar, certainly, but noble
Londonderry's Tourwas , in its own way—in fact there never was a puff
printed in the New Monthly , about Holderness House that had not some fun
Magazine, there appeared, j in it. The paragraph in question runs as

follows:—

Mr. Punch,'m your columns
a wicked attack upon the
work, which especially fell
foul of her Ladyship's
grammar. I can't say it
was in consequence of
vour remarks, but somehow

" ' On Monday evening a grand banquet was
given by General the Most Noble the Marquis of Lon-
donderry, to the officers of the Second Life Guards,
of which distinguished military coitjs the Noble
Marquis is Colonel. Several other eminent military
commanders, connected with other regiments, both
there teas no bad grammar m cayalry and infantry, had also the honour of

°', ,, , . I receiving an invitation.

"'Every preparation suitable to so important an
event was made by the noble and gallant Lord of
Holderness.'

" Have the goodness to
keep your eye upon the
man who writes the para-
graphs about the fetes at
Holderness House : and
correct that slave as you

" I think it is only at Holderness House that
you get this most noble style of writing. Com-
have admonished his noble j moners can't come near it. What a noble figure
mistress. i of speech that is in which the Marquis, because he

" I just read in the lives at Holderness House, Park Lane, is called
Herald (that is, in the the Lord of Holderness—in the same way, my
Standard, which is the Lord Lansdown might be called the Marquis of
same thing) that ' The Piccadilly, or your humble servant the gallant
Marchioness of Lon- \ Lord of St. Alban—from St. Alban's Place, Hay-
bonderry will have a the, \ market, where I and many other 'eminent com-
dansante at Holderness manders ' have cheap and airy lodgings.
House: nearly 300 cards "That touch about the 'other eminent com-
of invitation have been circulated among the leading aristocracy. The line is fixed at manders' can't be passed over without admiration
from 3 to 8 in the afternoon.' There were other military eminences, ' both

"What the deuce does this mean? How do you fix a line to a the dansante, and | cavalry and infantry;' therefore the Marquis is
how do you go on fixing it for five hours in an afternoon ? What is a tU dansante, and j an eminent military commander, and greater than
when was the of the feminine gender ? It is neuter in this country, but has always ; the others whom he 'honours with an invitation.'
been masculine in France—as stronger than most of the drinks imbibed there. i That is the way to make a dinner pleasant—

"About the noble Marquis, the same journal contains a paragraph, not conspicuous ' call it 'an important occasion;' tell your guests

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