Punch (44.1863)

May 2. 1863.]

PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI.

177

NO PROPHET B UT PUNCH!

Here we are—there you go—what do you say now?
Who prophesied for the Two Thousand Guineas except
Punch, or at least, who prophesied right but your Old
Original Predictor and Vaticinator. Yah! He’s not one
of the lying advertising humbugs, who, after a race,
announce that they “ sent the winner,” when the scamps
never did anything of the kind. He boldly proclaimed
the name of the winning horse a week before the race.
Who but he could have published this ?

PROPHECY POR THE GUINEAS.

You want to know the winning horse,

And where to put your pony.

There’s only one can win, of course;

They call him Maccaroni.

There! And who won? Why,CuALLONERon Maccaroni.
Of course. Yah, again! We don’t want any of your
winnings, we have enough money of our own, but you
won’t be fools enough to go to any of the prophets after
this. Yes, you will, for you are born idiots.

PLEASANT INTELLIGENCE.

Boy. “ Ah—you and Mrs. Drone are coming to see us next week in the
Country.”

Mr. Drone “ Are we ?—we have heard nothing of it.”

Boy. “ Oh, yes—because I heard Papa say to Mamma, that they had
SOME TIRESOME PEOPLE OOMING, AND THEY MIGHT AS WELL ASK ALL THE BORES
AT ONCE.”

Cultus of the Bull in Egypt.

The Times Correspondent at Alexandria thus writes :—

“ No Sultan has visited Egypt since Selim the First conquered
the country in 1517, and some old-fashioned Moslems here and in
Cairo think it so wonderful that the representative of the Prophet
should leave his capital, that they believe the end of the world is
comiDg, and have made their wills, forgetting how useless such a
proceeding would be if the foreboding came true.”

No, no ; the Mahometans who made their wills because
they thought the end of the world was coming were not
old-fashioned disciples of the Prophet. There can be no
doubt that they were Irish renegades.

Memory.

With many persons. Memory is no better than the Art
of Forgetting — the more especially when it relates to
umbrellas, books, calls, favours, or kindnesses that have to
be returned. In all these cases the power of remembrance
extends no farther than the faculty of remembering not
to remember.

Cockney Sporting Intelligence.—It is expected that
the rain will lay the dust against next Monday.

PUNCH’S ESSENCE OE PARLIAMENT.

April 20, Monday. Mrs. Britannia, M’m, your Government is
partially re-arranged. Allow Mr. Punch to introduce the new Secre-
tary-eor-War. The inferior is presented to the superior, but then the
gentleman is presented to the lady, which complicates the matter. Of
course the governor is greater than the governed, but how about the
gender question? We’ll say Earl de Grey and Ripon, Mrs.
Britannia: Mrs. Britannia, Earl de Grey and Ripon. A very
superior kind of young man, M’m, bom 1827—you knew him as Lord
Goderich. Two of his respected names are Samuel Robinson. He
was Under-Secretary-for-War last week. The Spectator (a very well
written paper, M’m) calls him the real Commander-in-Chief of the
Volunteers. He will do your work, excellently; but it is rather a bore
that the political heads of both Army and Navy should be in the Senate
and not in Congress. Pass on, Goody, my boy. Now, Lord Har-
tington. This is Lord Hartington, M’m, eldest son of the Duke
op Devonshire, and an M.A., and M.P. for North Lancashire, also a
Captain, two Majors, and a Deputy-Lieutenant. He has been to
America lately, this young gentleman, M’m, and the ladies admired
him, as we hope you will do. He is your Under-Secretary-at-War.
Pass on, my Hearty. Now, Mr. James Stansfeld. This is a
Radical, Mrs. B., and M.P. for Halifax, so the old Conservative, Pam,
is no bigot, you see. Mr. Stanspeld is the new Lord of Admiralty,
and the Daily Telegraph, in an honourable tribute to the new man, says
that there is nobody in the Commons who excels him in clearness of
intellect, purity of mind, and singleness of purpose, so that he must
much resemble Mr. Punch. These are the changes, Mrs. Britannia,
and the arrangement seems as good as circumstances will permit. Now,
nobleman and gentlemen, to your desks—Stanny, no, you go and
get re-elected. By the way, M’m, you won’t think the worse of
our youDg friend, James, but very much the reverse, that he is the

son-in-law of the excellent Mr. Ashurst, the invaluable friend of
Garibaldi.

Lord Elphinstone, born 1828, and a Commander R.N.. somehow
managed to let his ship come to grief on a shoal. Wnereby he
himself came to grief on the Admiralty, which wigged him uncom-
mon, and so severely that his friends thought they would make an
outcry in the Lords. Perhaps, on the whole, they had better have let
matteis alone, for the Protector Somerset is not exactly the man to
receive a remonstrance without immediately proceeding to aggravale
auy offence he may have given, and he came down upon the peccant
sailor with renewed vigour. We are bound to say that the answer was
that Lord Elphinstone had a pilot on board, and the old salr, Hard-
wicks, declared that a captain who should take the ship out of the
hands of a pilot, under the circumstances, would deserve to be “ broke.”
We don’t fracture Lords, and indeed the Duke was rather amusing in
his frankness, and said that it was not likely that he should exceed in
severity in the case of one who had such influential friends. So had
the offender been only plain Captain Elphinstone, it would have
been wiry times for him. The Admiralty offered him a court-martial,
but he was advised to be content with the wigging. We presume that
the pilot has long since been executed.

The Commons had an odd debate. Our gaols are very full of wicked
Roman Catholics, and it is not unreasonably urged that those evil
persons are in especial need of spiritual teaching. Of course, they
won’t listen to Protestant clergymen, and it is proposed to send them
advisers whom they will listen to; namely, priests. The Protestuut
party do not like this plan; first, because it is giving Catholicism a
triumph, and secondly, because the teaching will comprise what
Protestantism rejects. The Bill was fought, but common-sense tri-
umphed over Mr. Newdegate, who found Mr. Disraeli and Mr.
Henley dead against him, and the Bill, which is really a necessary
police measure, was carried.