DOI issue:
July to December, 1851
DOI Page / Citation link:https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.16608#0090
/8 PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI.
Chorus of Civic Dignitaries. Oh, it's too bad ! We won't stand it!—
Mrs. Alderman Portsoken. Well, Mr. P.; Lord Mayor or not—I
suppose we ain't to sleep in the streets ? I insist on being taken to a
lodging this minute.
Mrs. Alderman Gulchin. Oh ! this is dreadful, to be exposed in this way
men's waistcoats you could get into. But I vote we impeach the
Loud Mayor when we get back.
3rd Alderman. It's scandalous treatment, leaving us to rough it in
this way—t welve in a room, and our luggage left behind, and nothink
comfortable ! Catch me pleasuring at Paris again '
among the foreigners, and no Mr. G. \ t? t n t j. j* n 7 » ^ • . n i •
1st Common Councilman. And there's the dinner to-morrow, and ever j Enter Portsoken, mutant, followed by_ Commissionaires and Palais
Royal (Jut-fitters, bearing bundles.
Chorus of Aldermen. Here's Portsoken !
Portsoken. With dresses for all of you. Now, then, look alive ! I've
so many of us with no luggage !
2nd Common Councilman. And they say the hotels are all full,
Mrs. Alderman Gulchin. Oh, whatever is to be done !
1st Alderman. And this is what they calls entertaining the Corporation!
Tableau.—The Lodgingless and Luggageless Ones.
Scene VI.—Dressing for the Ball.—Time, five o'clock on Saturday. A
Barrack-room in Metjrice's,packed with every variety of shakedown.
Luggageless Aldermen discovered in various stages of deshabille.
1st Alderman {stout). Five o'clock'. — and the dinner's fixed at half-
past six ! Whatever is to be done, if Portsoken can't find things to
fit us ?
2nd Alderman {thin). I say, Candlewick ! there ain't many French-
had precious work to find your measures, I can tell you.
1st Alderman {with dignified reserve). They 're Court suits, I hope?
Portsoken {slightly taken aback). Not exactly our kind of Court suits,
you know ; but the style that's worn in high society here—so I'm told.
{The bundles are unpacked, the clothes distributed. And as words are
incapable of describing what the Aldermen looked like when
dressed a, la mode de Paris, we leave the task to our Artist's
vencil.
Tableau.—Dressing for the Banquet.
{The rest of the adventures of the Aldermen's Week, the Ball at the Hotei
de Ville, the Water-works at Versailles, the Fete at St. Cloud, and the
Review in the Champ de Mars, must be reserved for our next.)
THE UNHAPPY ALDERMEN, HAVING LOST THEIR, LUGGAGE, ARE OBLIGED TO BE RIGGED OUT
IN FRENCH CLOTHES.
The Long and the Short of it.
Mr. Chaplin said, at a railway meeting, that " it had been remarked
that when the speeches were long, the dividend was always short."
This is not unlike our Houses of Parliament, where the speeches arc
much too long, and the dividend (of public good) far too short. We
wonder if reversing the system—which has been tried long enough—
would be attended with a contrary effect. Perhaps if the speeches
were shorter, the dividends might be longer; or, better still, perhaps if
there were no speeches at all, the dividends might attain that extreme
length that nothing short of the abolition of the National Debt would
be the end of it!
We recommend a trial by all means, as there is everything to gain,
and nothing to lose by it!
An Aldermanic Joke.
We have already sent twenty pounds anonymously to the Chan-
cellor of the Exchequer, to try and quiet our conscience for having
perpetrated the following:—During the late Paris fetes, somebody
asked, in the hearing of an Alderman, what was the cause of the
residence of the Prefet being called the Hotel de Ville. "Clear
enough!'' was the Aldermanic reply: "it's called the Hotel de Veal
because it's so beautifully calved all over."
rumour in the citt.
The Mansion House is to be enlarged immediately; for it is rumoured
that the Lord Mayor has grown so big since his visit to Paris, that it
will be much too small to hold him.
Chorus of Civic Dignitaries. Oh, it's too bad ! We won't stand it!—
Mrs. Alderman Portsoken. Well, Mr. P.; Lord Mayor or not—I
suppose we ain't to sleep in the streets ? I insist on being taken to a
lodging this minute.
Mrs. Alderman Gulchin. Oh ! this is dreadful, to be exposed in this way
men's waistcoats you could get into. But I vote we impeach the
Loud Mayor when we get back.
3rd Alderman. It's scandalous treatment, leaving us to rough it in
this way—t welve in a room, and our luggage left behind, and nothink
comfortable ! Catch me pleasuring at Paris again '
among the foreigners, and no Mr. G. \ t? t n t j. j* n 7 » ^ • . n i •
1st Common Councilman. And there's the dinner to-morrow, and ever j Enter Portsoken, mutant, followed by_ Commissionaires and Palais
Royal (Jut-fitters, bearing bundles.
Chorus of Aldermen. Here's Portsoken !
Portsoken. With dresses for all of you. Now, then, look alive ! I've
so many of us with no luggage !
2nd Common Councilman. And they say the hotels are all full,
Mrs. Alderman Gulchin. Oh, whatever is to be done !
1st Alderman. And this is what they calls entertaining the Corporation!
Tableau.—The Lodgingless and Luggageless Ones.
Scene VI.—Dressing for the Ball.—Time, five o'clock on Saturday. A
Barrack-room in Metjrice's,packed with every variety of shakedown.
Luggageless Aldermen discovered in various stages of deshabille.
1st Alderman {stout). Five o'clock'. — and the dinner's fixed at half-
past six ! Whatever is to be done, if Portsoken can't find things to
fit us ?
2nd Alderman {thin). I say, Candlewick ! there ain't many French-
had precious work to find your measures, I can tell you.
1st Alderman {with dignified reserve). They 're Court suits, I hope?
Portsoken {slightly taken aback). Not exactly our kind of Court suits,
you know ; but the style that's worn in high society here—so I'm told.
{The bundles are unpacked, the clothes distributed. And as words are
incapable of describing what the Aldermen looked like when
dressed a, la mode de Paris, we leave the task to our Artist's
vencil.
Tableau.—Dressing for the Banquet.
{The rest of the adventures of the Aldermen's Week, the Ball at the Hotei
de Ville, the Water-works at Versailles, the Fete at St. Cloud, and the
Review in the Champ de Mars, must be reserved for our next.)
THE UNHAPPY ALDERMEN, HAVING LOST THEIR, LUGGAGE, ARE OBLIGED TO BE RIGGED OUT
IN FRENCH CLOTHES.
The Long and the Short of it.
Mr. Chaplin said, at a railway meeting, that " it had been remarked
that when the speeches were long, the dividend was always short."
This is not unlike our Houses of Parliament, where the speeches arc
much too long, and the dividend (of public good) far too short. We
wonder if reversing the system—which has been tried long enough—
would be attended with a contrary effect. Perhaps if the speeches
were shorter, the dividends might be longer; or, better still, perhaps if
there were no speeches at all, the dividends might attain that extreme
length that nothing short of the abolition of the National Debt would
be the end of it!
We recommend a trial by all means, as there is everything to gain,
and nothing to lose by it!
An Aldermanic Joke.
We have already sent twenty pounds anonymously to the Chan-
cellor of the Exchequer, to try and quiet our conscience for having
perpetrated the following:—During the late Paris fetes, somebody
asked, in the hearing of an Alderman, what was the cause of the
residence of the Prefet being called the Hotel de Ville. "Clear
enough!'' was the Aldermanic reply: "it's called the Hotel de Veal
because it's so beautifully calved all over."
rumour in the citt.
The Mansion House is to be enlarged immediately; for it is rumoured
that the Lord Mayor has grown so big since his visit to Paris, that it
will be much too small to hold him.