Punch: Punch (46.1864)

PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHAR TV ART.

3i

January 23,

1864.]

Country Boy. “ What’s he a doin’ of.”

Town Boy. “ Why, a Vendin' up the Church Clock, Stoopid.’

SCHLESWIG-HOLSTEIN.

(A German Drunken Sony.)

Schleswig !—grand word, sounds of swipes ;
Schleswig-Holstein—beer and pipes.
Dntchland’s claims are just ana clear;
Schleswig-Holstein—pipes and beer.

In tobacco cloudland dim,

Fill the beerpot to the brim,

Downsides up at one pull drain;
Schleswig-Holstein we will gam!

Schleswig-Holstein shall be free,

Just about as much as we.

Any fool may understand
Freedom’s home in Fatherland.

Therefore Schleswig-Holstein, mates.

Must be added to our states.

Bloodshed never mind how much,

Danish ground we ’ll make High Dutch.

England can’t conceive what for
We ’re about to plunge in war.

With Teutonic mind to think
Needs Teutonic smoke and drink.

Visions, through these fumes that rise,

Are concealed from British eyes;

There a German Fleet appears—
Schleswig-Holstein—drink your beers!

No such sailors, fleet to man;

Truer tars ne’er emptied can.

Floods of swipes with us agree.

So we ’re safe to stand the sea.

“ Lubbers! ” . though Britannia cries,

“ Hit a foe of your own size.

Let that little boy alone.”

Schleswig-Holstein we will bone.

Schleswig-Holstein, gallant band,

Go and wm—when you can stand.

Lie and smg, to stand unable,
Schleswig-Holstein under table.




CONTRABAND SPIRITS AT ROME.

It seems that Mr. Home, the Medium, is at present studying
sculpture at Home, unless he has by this time been conducted out of
the Papal premises, not to say dominions. The Spirits in which Mr.
Home is so large a dealer, are regarded as contraband by the Govern-
ment of the Pope. We are indebted to the Homan correspondent of
the Times for an extract from Mr. Home’s diary, being the record of an
examination which he underwent in the presence of the police, before
whom he had been summoned to give an account of that wonderful
autobiography which he has published under the title of Incidents of my
life, and which incredulous John Bull has received with extended
fingers, and a thumb applied to the extremity of his nose. The Papal
authorities, however, take a different view of Mr. Home’s book from
that hi which it presents itself to^ the British sight. They are evidently
inclined to make an auto dafe of his autobiography, and the result of
his interview with them was an order that he should leave Home in
! tHee days. . But for the interference of the British Consul, an involun-
tary egress from the Flaminian Gate, or some other outlet of the Eternal
City, would have added another incident to the life of Mr. Home. He
has, however, obtained permission to remain in Home on condition of
discontinuing that business in the spirit line, which, however, he dis-
owns alleging that he does not call spirits from the vasty deep, but
that they will. come when he does not call for them. As Mr. Home
was giving this account of his mediumship to his official interrogators,
the spirits, according to the subjoined extract from his own minutes of
what occurred, had the timely kindness to suit their action to his
word:—

Do you see the spirits asleep and awake ?—Both. Why do the spirits come to
a consolation, and to convince those who do not believe in the after
existence of the soul. What religion do they teach ?—That depends. What do you
ao to make thern come ? ’ I was about to reply that I did nothing, when on the
Unt . v e,rev, was writing there came clear and distinct raps. He then said,
.but the table also moves ! ’ Just as he was saying it the table did move.”

At present we must be content to say that this statement requires
continuation Who are its sponsors ? Homan police officers, perhaps ;
ut we would rather have had the phenomenon which they may suppose

themselves to have witnessed submitted to the inspection of a British
Inspector or two, of the Detective Division. The motion of inanimate
objects, naturally fixed, is represented as being so ordinary an occur-
rence at Home, that we might well expect to hear of the movements of
moveables. Where pictures and statues are apt to wink, it is not
astonishing that tables and other furniture should be given to turn.
The Papal Government apparently ascribes these several marvels of
motion to a spiritual cause; the image-winking, however, to the agency
of superior spirits, and the table-moving to that of inferior sorts, too
bad for rectification. There is reason to apprehend that the former
class of spirits will prove to be far above proof, and the latter as far
below it. Otherwise the Pope might order an experimentum crucis for
the extraction of truth, and the conversion of heretics. At all events,
if tables are found to turn in Mr. Home’s presence, notwithstanding
that of the officers of the Inquisition, it would be worth while, with a
view to see whether they would stop, to try holy water. In saying
this, however, let us not be understood as wishing to cast any aspersion
on Mr. Home, whose ambition to be a sculptor we highly applaud.
We are sure that we wish him every success hi chiselling marble at any
rate, and hope that his celebrity as a Medium will be exceeded by the
fame which he will acquire by the production of works above mediocrity.

The Two Dromios.

Mons. Mathieu de la Drome is to France what Admiral Fitzroy
is to England. He is the French, as our Admiral—who so nobly
weathers the storm—is the English, Clerk of the Weather. He is often
wrong, but oftener right, for many of his predictions have met with
most signal success. The two sharp-sighted seers into the middle of
next week agree on most points, especially those of the compass, and
there is but one little difference between them, and that is merely
nominal, for whereas Mons. Mathieu is the meteorological Prophet of
the Drome, Admiral Fitzroy may be called the Prophet of the Drum.

N.B. A Literary Correspondent is informed that the Author of the
Tragedy of Ion was not Steele.