Punch (15.1848)

fjpiME turns over a new leaf—page 1849,

It will take some pause to convince us that the leaf be turned; to assure us of the exit of Eighteen-Forty-Eight.
And for this good reason:—Eighteen-Forty-Eight has, all through his life, been such an uproarious knave, that we
cannot for awhile get his doings out of our ears. Like the bell that vibrates with the last stroke of twelve—with the
last pulsation of the dead year—so does the round world still hum with the hubbub of the deceased.

France rings with a brassy sound—the sound of a counterfeit Nap.

A crown has been suddenly dropt in Austria, and (though picked up again) we still hear the echo of the fall.
Prussia pricks up her ears, startled by the rumpling of parchment—the unfolding of a Constitution.
Rome, with Head separated still, like St. Denis, moves on.
Naples shifts uneasily under a lucifcr sceptre.

Spain, to be sure, is tolerably quiet; for, like a bankrupt pieman, she has no money to pitch and toss with.
The Russian Bear sucks his paws, seeming inclined to doze.

And John Bull, rejoicing from his show of cattle, smacks his lips at fat six inches on the ribs.

If, however, Eighteen-Forty-Eight have been a swaggerer, Eighteen-Forty-Nine, feeling himself a born
gentleman, will, no doubt, behave himself as such. In France, he will be the pink of courtesy and gentleness : he will