Punch (29.1855)

AcacsT 4, .855.]

PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI.

45

WHAT TO EAT, DRINK AND AVOID.

LINES BY A SCOTCHMAN,

is the extent to which
adulteration is carried,
that we cannot get even
our drugs in a pure
state, and it is almost
as difficult to get an
honest black dose, as an
honest glass of port. It
is horrible to think that

we cannot even make sure of a " cup of cold pison " in a sound condition, for our
prussie acid is diluted, and our laudanum is deprived of a large per centage of
its strength. Our bread, which is commonly considered the staff of life, has often
more life about it than is either wholesome or agreeable, lor it is sometimes a
mass of animal matter; and we need scarcely be surprised at meeting a loaf which
has made its way out of the bread-pan, which might easily be the case, if there
were anything like unity of movement amoDg the insects of which it is composed.
Among other expedients to increase the bulk of flour, is the mixture of a quantity
of chalk, so that it. really requires a knowledge of chemistry to distinguish one from
the other; and, if we mix up our crust with our slice of Cheshire, we may be
literally unable to tell the chalk from the cheese.

We were never very partial to sausages; nor is our appetite for them at all in-
creased by the discovery, that most of them are made of horses' tongues. It seems
from the evidence of Doctor Thomson, Professor of Chemistry at St. Thomas's
Hospital, that, the ultimate destination of every horse's tongue is, that it shall be
in some form or other passed down a human throat. All of us have a tongue in
our heads, but we little thought we have taken, perhaps, three or four horses'
tongues into our system, in the deceitful guise of sausage-meat. We feel seriously
disposed after reading the evidence before the Committee, to turn vegetarians, or
total abstainers from everything in the shape of food. Even our tea, which we
thought was at the most a compound of sloe and birch-broom, is said to consist of
iron filings, and some stuff called catechu, which is more fit for a cat to chew, than
for a human being to swallow. We wonder what the teatotallers will think of the
fact, that they have been consuming tons of iron, to say nothing of the catechu
and the other messes, of which the cup that queers but not inebriates is found to
be composed.______

A CHINESE INUNDATION.

E fancy this question
which has often been
put through the me-
dium of an advertise-
ment, seems to admit
of an easy answer; for
we ought to eat nothing,
drink nothing, and
avoid everything in the
shape of meat or drink,
while the present state
of things exists. The
evidence being taken
before a Committee of
the House of Commons,
discloses some startling
facts; and, indeed, it
will be impossible for
anyone who reads it to
enjoy a single morsel of i Starting aff Scots—like wud sky-rockets—

any sort of food. Such '< To sinfu' frastings doon the river,

To the sair emptying o' their pockets,
Eorbye derangements o' the liver.

On reading the folloicing startling announcement in a weekly

paper.

"The Libera] Scotch Members entertained the Lord Advocate a.L a
Whitebait dinner at Greenwich on Wednesday."

Did they sae ? I'm recht wae to hear o't:

I'd like to ken their names—the noddies !
F se wad, though, oor M.P. was clear o't:
He's nane o ' siccan thriftless bodies.

The Leeberal cause I 'se huld the main thing

That keeps us thack and rape thegither;
But leeberal in opinion's ane thing,
And leeberal in bawbees anither.

Sco'ch Members, at a Greenwich dinner,

Whose cost sets e'en pock-puddings grumbling !—
It maun be Hastie—the auld sinner—

That man a Scotchman !—it's just humbling !

Yet the backsliding's no that utter,
When ye tak tent o' the chief dishes.

Whitebait to kifcheD bread-and-butter—
Lt's teepical o' loaves an' fishes.

That thocht a' my objections closes
An' the fac' reads like a description,

How leeberal Israel dined auld Moses
After his spoilin' the Egyptian.

Nae doot our freens, true to their nation,
Spite o' you Hastie, and gastronomy,

Wad hauld their leeberal celebration
Wi' due attention to economy.

And dine where no that high the shot, is—
Though deeners may be waur by far—

Eor patriotic as your Scot, is,
He '11 no bleed twice at Trafalgar.

So that in bounds the lawings kept are,
Leeb'ralism folks may gie a loose to—

Let Scots uphaud the Crown and Sceptre-
It's a gran' crj—and a cheap hoose, too.

A DESPOT IN GRAIN.

King Bomba is making himself disagreeable in his small
way. If is a small way as regards ourselves and our Allies :
for Bomba cannot constitute himself a great nuisance to any-
body that is not in his piu'ches, as poor Poerio is, the
captive of this modern Mkzentius. Bomb* is prohibiting
the exportation of grain to our forces in the Crimea ; a line
of policy which, by glutting all the mills in his dominions
with grist, will render his despotism more grinding than
ever. Some time ago his sulphureous Majesty refused to
let us have any of his brimstone; and no doubt he persists
in withholding from us that unpleasant but necessary

The last advices from Melbourne announce that 14,000 Chinamen have lately
walked into the colony with the agreeable announcement that "all the rest are

coming after them." Victoria is said to be in want of population, and the want is j substance" Polyphemus had only "one eye; but with the
now likely to be supplied with what is popularly termed "a vengeance." Some- half of that organ he would have been able to see what,
how or other the Chinamen are not received with much enthusiasm by the colonists, I unfier existing circumstances, would be the best thing to do
and it is said that a law is to be passed to exclude the unwelcome strangers, though I wy_ such a petty tyrant as the present ruler of the land
it is evident that by shutting the door on the Chinese, the authorities would open j |jvecj m> jr, _ t0 De wished that he were still extant, to
the door to a great evil. _ One of the complaints against the Chinamen is, that they
take more than their fair share of water, which they probably require for their
tea. Victoria must be badly off indeed for rivers if it is apprehended that the
thirst of the Chinese will occasion a drought. We defy the most inveterate of tea-
totallers to get through more than his daily gallon of the element; arid supposing
every one of the 14,000 Chinamen to be able to gulp down the contents of a moderate
sized water-butt, there are surely sufficient, sources from which this drain on the
aquatic wealth of the colony might be counterbalanced.

Perhaps when the colonial thirst for gold is accompanied by a thirst of a more
natural and wholesome character, the diggers will begin to think of digging for
water instead of digging perpetually for the precious metal. It will be indeed a
sad lesson to the money-grubbing population of Victoria if it. should come to pass
that water in pints should prove a more really desirable acquisition than gold in
quartz. _

Sib. Charles Napier ansriiy refuses to be a G. C. B. We thought he was one
already,—Graham's Cross Boy.

take this small sovereign by the nape of the neck, and
fling him either into Etna, or a league or two off Sicily
into the sea. Cannot England and Erance, between them,
in default of Polyphemus, contrive to pitch Bomba into
the middle of next week ? As to the grain which he has
the impertinence to deny us—why Mr. Eisenberg, sup-
ported by a British man-of-war, would very soon succeed
iu extracting all his corns fiom him.

King Clicquot's Colours.

The wits of Eredejrick William Have gone Berlin
wool-gathering, 'the colour of the King's proceedings ca-i
no longer pass under the denomination of neutral tint; and
affairs in the quarter of Sans Souci are looking decidedly
(Prussian) blue.