Punch (44.1863)

238

PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI. [June 6, 1863.

EARL GREY AND THE GARTER.

Punch is requested to
publish the following
correspondence:—

Discount Palmerston
to Earl Grey.

“ May 24.

“My dear Lord Grey,
“ It is my intention
to advise that the vacant
Garter be conferred
upon yourself. So put
your best leg foremost,
if there is any choice.

“ Believe me, yours
affectionately,

“ Palmerston.5'
“ The Earl Grey.'”

Earl Grey to Vis-
count Palmerston.

“ May 26.

“ Dear Palmerston,
“ Though your note
of the 24th instant is
couched in terms which
I suppose you consider
jocular, I will assume
that you have too much
good sense to mean a
joke, and I will conclude
that I am to be made a
Knight of the Order of
the Garter, if such be
my own pleasure.

“ I will accept the Garter upon the following terms, and no others:

“ I will not be dictated to as to which leg 1 shall wear it on. The Chapter shall
be held on a day most convenient to myself. Nobody else shall be made at the
same time, no matter what other vacancies may occur. I will have a discount off
the fees for ready money. 1 will have the inscription on my garter in English. The
Prelate of the order may attend, but he shall be assisted by another bisnop, of my
own selection—not that I care about, bishops, but Dr. Sumner’s politics are

not mine. The ribbon shall be supplied by my own milliner,
and shall be of the width I please. And I won’t sit by you
during the ceremony.

“As my character is proverbially that of one who
desires to male everything as pleasant as possible, and as
I never permit any crotchets of my own to interfere with
business, I send you this distinct statement of my ultima-
tum, that you may have no excuse in the event of any
hitch.

“ I remain, yours truly,

“ Grey ”

“ The Viscount Palmerston, K.G.”

A GOOD RIDDANCE.

’Tis an ill wind that blows nobody good. The Civil War
in America may have bereft the North of many valuable
citizens; but has also lightened it of a considerable
number of rowdies and ruffians. The following statement,
which occurs amongst Reuter’s telegrams, will show that
fratricidal strife to have not been quite an unmixed evil to
one party at least of the brethren who have been for the
last two years and a half engaged in cutting one another’s
throats:—

“ General Thomas Francis Meagher has resigned the command
of the Irish brigade. He says that the brigade no longer exists. The
assaults against Fredericksburg in December last reduced the brigade
to something less than a minimum regiment of infantry.”

Except as food for powder, what use could the Yankees
have made of the heroes lately under the command of
General “Meagher, of the Sword ? ” They have served
their turn, and been consumed in fitting employment for
fugitive traitors to the British constitutional Crown. They
have perished in warring as mercenary soldiers, for the
price of blood, to subjugate men who are fighting for their
country. So may the foes of England fall! But now having
used up all their Irish, had not our Yankee friends better
conclude peace with the South and cave in, rather than
subject themselves to a Conscription, and begin to spend
really valuable lives in a hopeless struggle P They have
worked the rowdies and the Irish out of the Union. The
rowdies and the Dish are the scum of the earth. They are
the salt of it. They have improved the scum of the earth off
the face of it; now let them stop, have mercy on themselves,
and not go on to sacrifice the clear grit.

A SOMES’ CUP DAY.

Thy Bill, 0 Somes ! is like the wedge whereof the end that’s thin
Is set unto a chink that we may smite and drive it in.

If we prevail the liquor trade on Sundays to restrain.

We will strike on till England shall admit the Law of Maine.

When we have won that victory, and wholly stopped the sale
Of spirituous liquors, wine, stout, porter, swipes, and ale;

My friends, then Ascot will become another kind of place :

And thither will the brethren go to see a Gold Cup Race.

There have the Gipsies pitched their tents: but fortunes are not told
Together have they gathered Camp Meetings but to hold.

And place is found no longer for the Thimble and the Pea,

Now that the strongest liquor of an Englishman is Tea.

Not any more at snuff-boxes, and such like idle toys,

Are sticks now thrown by men whom mirth has moved to play like
boys.

Stakes at Aunt Sally, m her mouth with pipe of little span,

No more are cast by any Duke—or any other man.

Look how the laden carriages are crowded o’er the plain!

There’s lobster salad, chicken too, but there is no champagne.

The popping corks on every side fall fast upon the ear,

Yea, but those corks are not champagne; they’re only ginger beer.

See on how many a vehicle, or “ drag ” by worldlings hight,

The men are all arrayed in suits of black, and ties of white;

And if thou cast thine eyes abroad, thou’It notice here and there.
One of them up, and holding forth with hands that saw the air.

So thick they were in coming down, that Ebenezer stuck
With Little Bethel, Salem, and Bethesda in the ruck;

And oh ! when that dead-lock unlocked lips innocent of beer,

The blessings they did utter it was beautiful to hear !

Homeward, all sober, singing hymns, they ride at evening grey,
And fling tracts at the damsels right and left who line the way;
And so to pass the Stale Beer Bill the Commons let us pray,

To have the Somes’ Cup run upon a future Ascot Day.

“ A REFRACTORY TELESCOPE.”

An optician of Hebrew name (we mention this to his advantage, as
will be seen) announces that for the sum of Five Pounds he will
show us—

“ Double Stars, the face of a sheep and the features of a man four miles, the sign-
board of a public-house five miles, shot marks upon a target two miles, and time by
a church clock ten miles.”

We do not understand whether the faces of the sheep and of the man
are to be four miles off, or four miles long, but never mind. We doubt not
that if the advertiser means four miles off, his instrument will do all that
he promises, because “a Jew’s eye” was always a phrase for a valuable
article, and a,fortiori a Jew’s telescope must be still better than his eye.
But why should we pay five pounds to see a double star when we can see
Alboni, and hear her too, for a guinea P Why should we pay the former
sum to see a sheep’s face, when we can see Buckstone’s Sheepface lor
five shillings, whenever he puts up the Village Lawyer ? As to seeing a
public house four miles off, that is exactly what we shouldn’t like,
and we should much prefer seeing it four minutes off, especially if
we were thirsty. Finally, the tremendous distance at which our
Hebrew friend puts the church can, we fear, have been suggested only
by his hostility to the Establishment, and that is a sentiment we must
strongly reprehend. “Till, I can buy a glass,” says King Richard III.,
meaning, of course, that he has money in his till to do so, (a beautiful
new reading,) and so have we, but we shall certainly not buy one of
the glasses in question, until the advertisement is brought more into
accordance with our views of grammar, economy, good fellowship, and
Protestantism.