Punch (34.1858)

174

PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI.

[May 1, 1858.

We learn through the Times that brave Sir Colin Campbell has
had Ins gallantry put most severely to the test. The ladies whom he
left at Agra with their luggage, have made a very formidable trial of
his fortitude. Encamped behind their bandboxes, their dislodgment
was most difficult. Sib Coltn's boldest Highlanders flinched to face
the petticoats. The entire British Army was, in fact, kept, in check
by them. This is what the Times says of the Battle of the Bonnets :—

" The Agra convoy came in to Cawnpore to-day, and thua one great cause of
anxiety has been removed from the mind of the chief. These ladies and their little
ones have been a most embarrassing ingredient in his calculations. At Lucknow

weed, chez Neptune. But no doubt a bishop can explain to us thai j

it is all right. THE BLOCKADE OF THE BANDBOXES

Friday. The Bishop of Exeter made an eloquent appeal upon the
want of church accommodation for the people. He says that to seat
only 58 per cent, of the inhabitants of London, we want 670,000 new
sittings. And his Lordship, upon whom, in his advanced age (as with
Lord Lyndhubst), descend gleams of real liberality, denounced the
Pew system, and declared it illegal. This is indeed an Exeter Change.

Ministers, taunted with having abused Lord Canning, declared
that they had abused him bypothetically, and, as they now think the
hypothesis untenable, the abuse evaporates. As " Oude is pacilied"
(or was, on the 21st ult.), the Government has written to tell Canning
to be merciful. We hope he will not interpret this into a hint to ,

, , c o , i-j c rn nnn e ii j c at o „™ ne was m a fever at the various small de ays which the v considered necpssarv *nrl

retract SlR COLIN'S bid of 50,000 rupees for the head of NaNA SaHIB, courteous as he is to women, he for once was obliged to be 'Tlittle stern' when h9
which, indeed, we may hope has already been knocked down, 01" founa the dear creatures a little unreasonable. In order to make a proper effect

knocked off, to the gallant Highland Chief." ^oat °f ]idi^s c??e °™ iu ,their be8t g°wns and bonnets. Sir Coun got

ThprP was o-nincr to hp a ptpmt demonstration against the Pennv fid,gety,y7""1,116 found himself made a maitre etiquette and a.n arbiter morum among
mere was aoing to oe a great demonstration against tne renny (illeS of bandboxe3j • best bonnets.' and 'these few little clothes trunks-' but he

Stamp on Cheques, alluded to 111 the above exquisite poem, iiut, as sustained his position with unflinching fortitude, till at length, when he thought he
it Seemed to be nobody's business to begin, Mb. DiSBAELI quietly got had • seen the last of them ' out of the place, two young ladies came trippingly in

the resolution passed, and left its intended opponents staring like L™^*^^ and then, with nods and smiles!

i f ii • i .i i .i ± u u t • departed, saying graciously, 'We'll be back again presently.' 'No ladies no ■

members of the porcine race when the death-stab has been inflicted. you.u be good enough to do nothing of the kind/ exclaimed he; ' you have been

here quite long enough I am sure, and I have bad quite enough trouble in getting

------- you out of it.' The Agra ladies ought to have been ready long ago. They were

warned over and over again, but—Well, it's the old story. It is rather a joke—too
rn-n* i~ r. n »Wm m-n a Tr-rmmTU , c011;"1,011 to be appreciated—to keep a husband waiting while 'one is putting ou

lLA-rOr AND lLA ilLl ILJi. | one s bonnet,' but when the cares of the toilette prove an obstacle which an army

' cannot overcome, which frustrate strategic combinations, delay great sieges, and
bstinence Or the profession of it ■ affect the fortunes 01 a whole campaign, it is sufficient to make generals, at all
does not prevent the avoider, real ~^sh that good Mother Eye's earlier style was now in fashion among her

or pretended, of strong drink, I w ... „ . , „ .

from indulging in very strong Ian-! Waiting for these Agra ladies was really Agra-waiting; and we
o-uao-e Mb Gotjgh 'the Temper -' can fc wonder at Sib Colin getting out of temper at it. As Hannibal
ance orator applied to the Court of used vmegar in getting through the Alps, so, in cutting out his way
Queen's Bench the other dav, for a tbrpugh these mountains of luggage, Sib Colin was obliged to try a
criminal information against one ![ule sourness Bandboxes ares quite a new materiel m warfare, and
Dr. Lees, another teetotal agi- ! lP w°uld ?uzzl% any general to know what best to do with such
tator, for having falsely accused Our troops might have been led to several more

him in writing of intoxicatin"- vlctones> bad not the toilettes of these ladies in (Agra)waitmg stopped
himself with opium, having called l^,,wu3- ,, , , . , , , .,

him a "rank hypocrite," and "as , . V,Ve, ^ould expect to be called a wretch for our barbarity if we
wicked a man as breathed in the lunted that in future on any such occasion, it would really almost
Queen's dominions," and having frve SUC}\ right not to wait for them Surrounded by their

said, in allusion 1o him, that the i baggage, they might be left in perfect safety till the army came that
" marks of the beast could not be I wa{, aSa"i; An Englishwoman s crinoline may now be deemed her
so easily eradicated " castle. Were a row of good stiff petticoats thrown up by way of

Mr. Googh belongs to the " National Temperance League," which outworks, the position of the ladies would be rendered quite impreg-
limits its impertinence to moral suasion, whilst Dr. Lees is the "abl,e- Except by actual bombardmen , no enemy could force it; and
champion of a rival society called "The Alliance," which, attempts to the heaviest ol battering-trams would almost be out-metalled,
constitute itself a greater nuisance than the other, by trying to get a ! t —■

Maine law introduced into this country. The Court refused Mb. j

GorjGH's application- naturally thinking that a charge of libel brought; STRAIGHTFORWARD DIPLOMACY,

by one teetotaller against another for having accused him of drunken-
ness, was too ridiculous to be entertained. The high Court of Queen's Walewski to Malmesbtjey
Bench is not the tribunal to adjudicate on a trumpery affair like that.

A matter so small and petty would properly constitute a police-case— {Translated)
the defendant being had up on the charge of haying been sober and Now wliat do you say to tne integrity of your British Jury ? They
abusive, unless it could be proved tbat he had, m fact, been drunk and liave acquitted Bebnaed, although the evidence proved, as plain as a
abusive ; and, whether m the former case or the latter, the demands of, pikestaff, that he forwarded Obsini his bombs, procured the materials
justice would be satisfied by fining the man 5s. ! 0f ys fulminating powder, probably made it, and hired Rudio to serve

him. What have you got to say to that ?

THE REV. LOLA MONTES.
Among the recent American news there is a slatement that—

Lola Montes gave, as a lecture at Hope Chapel, New York, a portion of her

Malmbsbuby to Walewski.

The Jury were bound to give Bebnaed the benefit of any doubt.
They had some little doubt whether he meant to abet the murder of
anybody in particular. They conceived it possible that he thought the

Autobiography. The audience nearly filled the chapel." [ bombs were wanted for general insurrectionary purposes

Have our kinsmen tbe Americans no sense, or a very strong sense, of' w,„mri - if1Iir„„„nov

oddity and incongruity? When they rush to a chapel to hear Lola! Walewski to Malmesbuei.

Montes, is it because tbe notion of Lola Montes in the pulpit strikes < But they knew that he was a conspirator ; and a dangerous fellow ;
them as being particularly odd, or because they see nothing particular that he meant mischief of some sort; that ten to one he did know
in it, and simply want to hear her? We are not informed whether the j very well that Obsini meant to kill the Empebob: that, at any rate.

experiences which Lola related were of a spiritual or a general nature;

he deserved to be hanged, whether the indictment against him could

that they were of the former kind, we believe does not follow from the be precisely proved, or not. They ought to have found him guilty
fact that they were delivered in a Yankee chapel. Jonathan appears without standing on a point which was nice and doubtful, and did not
to have little notion of what we call a sacred edifice ; and Lola's ! much signify.

discourse is as likely to have been comic as serious. No doubt, how- j Malmesbuby to Walewski.

ever, it was instructive enough in its way ; more so, perhaps than the w d >t d tMugs ^ that kind of way in this country,
customary sermon of the Rev. Elihtj Snueeles ; and let us hope that

the congregation that sat under Lola Montes were edified. — ■ — _-=■

Absit Omen.

Pkince Napoleon has built himself a house in Paris, on the
model of the House of Diomede, in Pompeii. When does he expect
the lava from the Mountain ?

The Purification of Misfortune.

a refined similk, by mr. br aid wood, of the fire brigade.

A Geand Disaster often has the effect of eliciting that which is truly
valuable out of a man. It is like a "fearful conflagration," at which
the only thing picked out of the ruins are the solid lumps of gold.