Punch (37.1859)

1 November 12, 1849.] PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI. 199

TO CORRESPONDENTS.

1

; A Pelican ©f the Wilderness inquires whether his
handwriting is good enough to obtain him a situation
under Government ? The writing is not very bad ; but
we doubt whether a letter in which autograph is spelt
! with an initial “ h,’’ and two concluding “ f’s,” would

! gain the writer anything much higher than, perhaps, an

Under-Secretaryship of State, unless Loan Malmesbury
should return to office.

j A Young Father.—Certainly, if you have done Mr.
Disraeli the distinguished honour of christening your
baby after him, you have a right to apply to that gentle-
; man for a sovereign or two, in the child’s name. The

Marquis of Westminster usually sends a £5 note in
such cases. The Nurse is the proper person to send to
Grosvenor Gate.

Letty the Brown Girl.—If your love for him be . so
intense and disinterested as you describe it, we think
that you should not have refused to say “Yes” until
you had seen the receipt for his current half-year’s life
assurance. You should have taken his word, and the
entry he showed you in his Letts's Diary, that he had
paid it. Still, in these days, young girls cannot be too
careful.

i Edward Ci.onDON is very anxious for an introduction to a
refined family, in which there are some elegant young
ladies. His laudable object is not so much^natrimony,
for he has no money, as to be induced gradually to wean
himself from the habits of inebriation, keeping his hat
on in a room, wearing muddy boots, and smoking a
short clay pipe. He thinks that in time, if ho had fami-
liar access to such a household, ho might be cured of
some, if not all, of these practices. Any West End
family aesiring such a guest can write to Mr, Punch.
i Amor Virtutis says that he never goes to a friend’s house
without feeling an almost irresistible desire to steal the
spoons. He asks, is this a crime ? Certainly not; it is
mere organisation: and if you wish for the spoons, what
are a few ounces of white metal compared to a fellow-
creature’s happiness? No true friend would grudge you
J such a trifle.

Maria.—We can hardly advise you how to turn your
Grecian nose into a nez retrousst, which you say Frede-
rick likes; but something may be done by rubbing it
upwards whenever you use your pocket-handkerchief,
and by thinking constantly of handsomer gills than
yourself.

j A Young Header is informed that the beautiful lines—

“ How doth the little busy bee
Improve each shining hour,”
arc Lord Byron’s. They occur in Lalla Rookh, where
Roderick Dhu, the Last of the Goths, reproaches Clara
Vere de Vere for idleness.

i Eleonora X.—The author you name is one of the most
virtuous as well as one of the handsomest men of the
day; hut as he has already three wives, and is engaged
six deep, your chance is almost hopeless. Still, send him
the £500 note, under cover to us.

Lector Insipicus asks who is the author of the lines—

“ Twinkle, twinkle, little cow,

How I wonder at you, how!

Up above the world so bright,

Warm, and fresh, and sweet, and white.”

We do not remember to have met with them, but they
read like Cowley.

Sarah Jane Doddridge.—Although we think that meta-
physical disquisition is not properly within the range of
a secular periodical, we have no objection to reply to
your inquiry, and say that we do not believe corn-plas-
ters to be anything but palliatives, and that you must
get the corn out.

, A Conscientious Flunkey.—“ Not at home ” is a means
of sparing persons’ feelings. “ Out ” would be a false-
hood. If you were to say “ Engaged,” a caller might
wish to wait; if you were to say “ Does not wish to see
anybody,” vanity instantly whispers that an exception
is or ought to be made in the inquirer's case. Whereas,
“Not at home” means anything or nothing, and the
visitor goes away tranquil. If you were our Jeames,
and intruded on your betters with scruples of the kind,
you would be served as the elder Nicholas was by the
Saint of that name in Ms. Barham's ballad,
j Magdalene.—We pity your taste; but if you think a
spangled officer, who wears his golden epaulettes upon
j his brow, a nobler being in the scale of creation than your

despised ironmonger, take Mars and leave Vulcan.

| Kikes.—No person who wishes to be in health will walk

less than a quarter of a mile daily, unless the weather is
bad, or the exertion exceedingly distasteful. The more
sleep we take, the better. The poets have said, “How
beautiful is sleep; ” and, besides, we knew it without
them.

j Studious Samuel has burned down several houses, in con-
sequence of his habit of reading after going to bed at
night. He asks us whether he ought to discontinue the
practice. We can only say, that if such trifles deter
j him from improving his mind, he has taken a name

which he does not deserve.

j Knave of Clubs.—Your friend may have been somewhat
hasty in throwing the cards in your face, and knocking
you down with the candlestick ; but if we had been your
opponent, and you had said “How Hot,” and your
partner had played two Hearts, we should have shied a
tumbler at you.

G. Fletcher.—We read all the plays you sent, and thought
them very good ; but, unfortunately, our laundress has
disposed of them, by mistake, to' a butter merchant,
whose name the poor woman cannot remember. You
had better write some more, and keep copies this time.

A Thoughtful Glazier.—Divide the rectilinear are of
polarity by the cube of arithmetical parallelopipedal
progression, and the product will be what you ought to
pay for putty.

A Lover of his Country.—Training a Rifle Corps does
net exempt you from all taxation of every kind what-
ever ; but if enough lovers of their country join, it may
exempt Mr. Gladstone from the necessity of putting on
some more taxation to carry on a war. As to your
squint, we see no objection to that; indeed, it may help
to deceive an invading enemy.

A Constant Reader.—Nay, with pleasure. Besides, is
it not everyone’s duty to inform those who are less
instructed than himself? R. I. P. in an obituary means
“ Respected in the parish.”

Pesteratus.—No, it is undoubtedly unlawful for you to
fire a pistol at a person bringing you a writ, or a sub-
poena. We are not so sure about the case of a County
Court summons ; but you had, perhaps, better take
counsel’s opinion before discharging the weapon.

J. V. P.—Nothing is more snobbish than imagining offences,
or taking them where they are not intended. If he called
you an everlasting idiot, with no more brains than a
pumpkin, and not half so much heart as a cabbage, we
suppose it was only in playful badinage. If, as you say,
it was before ladies, this proves it was only in fun ; for
who quarrels in their presence? You had better beg his
pardon for having been irritated.

Eborax sends us a packet of original articles, and promises
to send a hamper of game. If he will be kind enough to
send the hamper, and send for the original articles, we
shall be much obliged.

A Sincere Admirer.—We don’t want any advice ; and if
you don’t like us, you needn’t take us in. Is it you, do
you think, or we, who are obliged by your paying three-
pence for a casket of unequalled wit and inimitable wis-
dom ? Better consider that problem before you talk of
patronising. We patronise you, and creation generally.

Betty.—Go to bed.

Damon and Pythias.—It is not a good thing to see two
brothers so intimate and inseparable. When you see it,
you may conclude that there are some discreditable
family secrets, which each is afraid the other will reveal
if allowed to form a new friendship.

Black-eyed Susan.—And he had a perfect right to give
you the black eye, if you used the language you mention.
No man likes to be told that he is losing his figure,

A Young Naturalist.—A fungus is not quadruped,

as your cousin asserts, but a uniped. We agree with
you that the flavour is rather inane, and so thought
Lactantius Varro, when he wrote Fungar inani
munere.

Phiebe Ann.—With every disposition to promote the
marriages of our fair correspondents, we are unable to
agree with you that a young gentleman’s asking you
whether you did not think Walworth a nice place to live
in (he living there) is such an offer of marriage as will
enable you to bring an action for breach of promise.
Try to get him to be more gushing.

Furiosus.—We sec no objection to your going, as pro-
posed, to Bath, nor indeed, when there, to your getting
your head shaved.

Ulick Theodore O’Brien.—We have destroyed your
address, and burned all your manuscripts, and if you
come bothering us any more, we have left orders in the
office that whoever is on duty shall forthwith punch
your head, and then take you to the police-station
across the street. Now don’t provoke us to harsher
methods of getting rid of an Irish poet.

Frances-Philipp a.—Your case is a very hard one. Your
husband avails himself of your habit of lying in bed
to breakfast and read novels, to help himself to the
best of the coffee. It is mean in him, but you are with-
out remedy. You might, however, revenge yourself by
giving the servant a hint to boil his eggs hard, and
frizzle his bacon to chips.

A Lover of Sights.—The tenure by which the Duke of
Wellington holds Apsley House is his exhibiting
every room in it to any person whose name is either
Arthur, Wellesley (or Wesley), Duke, or Welling-
ton,—in short who has either the Christian name or
surname of the Great Duke. Y'our card is generally
sufficient, but it is best to take your baptismal cer-
tificate, lest the porter should be in a bad humour.

A Bereaved One.—Your lines to the memory of a Belov’d
Iluncle are not deficient in sentiment, but would not be
generally interesting. People don’t care about their
uncles. And what is the meaning of the line—

“ Thy Spirrit could not Mix with Common Clay.”

Did not the old party like his pipe with his glass of
grog ? In that case he was a Nass, and unworthy of
your Muse.

Anthony Rowlev.—You have no right to have your in-
dentures cancelled because your master insists on your
washing your face every day. We allow that he is a
tyrannical brute, but such is the law of England.

Inquirer.—Colney Hatch is so called from the great
number of conies which used to bo hatched there. To
take their eggs was felony under the forest laws of our
barbarous ancestors.

Frederic Peterson (Lambeth) wants to be told, privately,
“who Schiller was.” We grant no private replies,
and suspect that there are so many hundreds of persons
who would like to ask the same question, that our public
answer will be a favour. Schiller was a Hungarian,
who fought undor the banner of Don Juan of Austria,
in hi3 campaigns against the Spaniards ; and having
been wounded at the capture of Hohenlinden, was con-
verted to Lutheranism by the celebrated Bossuet, and j
afterwards wrote the famous Works of Rabelais, which
he dedicated to Catherine de’ Medicis. He died a Car- :
thusian ; and his widow, re-marrying, espoused Horace j
Walpole. Now you know as much as Viscount
Williams.

Thespianensis.—We have repeatedly said that we will
not undertake to give either the ages, heights, or
weights of actors and actresses. We believe, however,
that Mr. B. Webster is not more than seven feet high,
and that he never played before King Charles the
Second. Mr.Ciiari.es Mathews has been vaccinated.
You have no right to take a church hassock into the
pit and put it on to the seat to make you sit higher, as,
if we sat behind you, you should find,

Little Jeremiah keeps pickles in a currant jelly pot in
his bed-room, and puts them on a chair by his bedside
at night, that he may eat them when he wakes in the
morning. His father threatens him with meat to his i
pickles, namely, cold pig, if he perseveres in this ;
epicureanism. The poor boy should plead the pedigree
of a pickle, as deduced by a celebrated etymologist.
King Jeremiah, Jeremiah King, Jerry King, Gherkin,
Pickled Cucumber. ■

Emma’s Sister.—Your poetry i3 very charming, and had ■
we space we should have great pleasure in publishing
it ali. As it is, we must find room for a scrap : —

I KNOW I AM A FrETTY GlRL.

I know I am a pretty girl,

Although my cousins sneer,

Sly teeth are all as white as pearl,

My eyes are bright and clear.

My foot is very small and neat
(To mention it’s no blame),

But what is most divinely sweet,

My Henry thinks the same.

And I can sing, and I can waltz,

And make a pudding, too,

And if I have some little faults,

I shall not tell them you.

My hair has got a natural curl,

Amelia is my name;

I know I am a pretty girl,

And Henry thinks the same.

Go on, dear, music publishers eagerly pay for much j
worse songs than that, and some composers think them
“ capital words.”

Matilda and Rosy have had their fortunes told by an old :
woman in the Westminster Road, and they want to
know whether we think there is “anything in it,” as
she certainly told them some extraordinary truths. She
told Matilda that something would reach her ears that
would surprise her, and sure enough next day her
mother gave her a sound slap on each side of the face ■
for impertinence. Rosy was told that she would shortly
have a loss, and in three days she lost her place for
reading the Son-ows of an Unhappy One, while she let
the mutton be roasted to a cinder. Our young friends
seem fair samples of a fortune-teller’s clients, and
nothing we could say would do them any good.

A Beginner.—Leave off,

A Gravesend Belle complains of the young men of that ;
metropolis, who, she says, seem afraid to*speak to a
girl when they have been introdueed to her, though
they are impudent enough before introduction, and
stare at you like—we are sorry to say we cannot print
her porcine illustration. Perhaps her hints may do them
good, but we always thought them muffs.

Horrescus.—Your song of the Night Mare, your Ode |
written on a Dissecting Room Table, your Lines on
Galvanising a Deceased Donkey, and your Chants of
the Cemetery and Catacombs, are all extremely elegant,
and highly creditable to you, but we fear might not be
acceptable to nervous readers. We give a specimen :— |

Then under his ear in terror and fear,

The galvanical wire they apply,

And the Donkey he opened his ugly mouth,

And winked with his fishy old eye.

His leg it swung round, and behold on the ground
Five students arc stretched in a row,

And the electrician, in sad condition,

Cried, “Well, if that ain’t a Go.”

Barbara.—It is certainly “ very unlucky to cut your .
finger nearly off on a Friday,” but we should not con-
sider it an instance of the very highest good fortune if we
achieved that feat on any other day of the week. Yes,
any girl who cuts all the bread and butter for the
family is a good girl, and ought to have an addition to
her pecuniary allowance.

Antiquarian.—The Edgeware-road is so called from
there being nothing sold in the shops but cutlery.

Miss Laura Macoregor.—Saturate the hair every night
with syrup of poppies to which a gill of maraschino has
been added; flour the head well, and let the mixture
remain in the hair all night. You will find your hair
thick enough in the morning. If you cannot get
maraschino, treacle and the yolk of egg will do.