DOI issue:
October 29, 1864
DOI Page / Citation link:https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.16874#0182
176
PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI.
[October 29, 1864.
HOW TO TALK TO THE FARMERS.
E thought that Mr. Disraeli
had done about the boldest
thing he ever attempted in the
course of his life, when he pre-
sumed to address a meeting or
British Farmers in a cheerful
strain, and to assure them that
they were not utterly ruined.
In fact, we considered that the
right honourable gentleman
had pretty well done for him-
self by launching such an in-
sult at his friends, and that he
must be intending to abdicate
in favour of some Oppositionist
who has a finer sense of what
is due to the trampled and op-
pressed B. E. A nice hornet’s
nest he has got himself into
by his indiscretion. But in
case the author of Coningsby
should once more venture him-
self in the presence of a bu-
colic audience, we recommend
him to study the following
Model Speech, composed with
a view to the tastes of the
melancholy agriculturists :—•
Gentlemen,
Yes, let me repeat, Gen-
tlemen, for when we have lost
everything else, gentility re-
mains to console us. It is
with great melancholy pleasure
that I rise to propose the next
toast, if indeed it be not a
mockery to wreathe the flowing bowl when the cup of sorrow is so full. I will not
add to your afflictions by describing them at any length. The British Earner is
indeed, in the poet’s language,—
“ The child of misery, baptised in tears,”
and Cobden and Bright are his scowling godfathers, while Eree Trade is his cruel
godmother. There is no comfort for him, for, much as I desire to show you some
little bit of blue in the dark sky, I dare not predict that the Corn Laws will be
re-imposed in the coming Session. Still, you must remember that you are English-
men. I know, alas! too well, your sorrows and privations. I have heard of
farmers who have felt it their duty to deny themselves port wine at more than
eighty shillings, and I have within the last few days been told a harrowing story—
no, I am in no mood for jest, and I do not allude to the harrow that tears your
clods—a story of an agriculturist who has been compelled to buy an upright piano-
forte instead of a grand, for the faithful and sorrowing wife of his bosom. Other
grievous tales of distress have reached me, but I hesitate to narrate them. I know
of my own knowledge that men who have been accustomed to hunt five days in
the week now often hunt but three; and that others have been reduced to shoot
but four times where they used to shoot six. In my own parish a farmer whose
daughters have been accustomed to be instructed in singing by a fashionable
Professor who came down from London, has intimated to the poor girls that in
future they must be content with the ministrations of a circumambulant musician of
the Hebrew persuasion, and, though you will hardly believe it, the saddened father
was obliged to deny himself the happiness of taking them up to town for the first
night of Masaniello. But I will not accumulate such instances. I know that
they will arise to the individual recollections of each and all of you. But again I
say, remember that you are Englishmen, and bear your grief in manly silence. I
do not say that better times will come, but worse cannot. It is something to be at
the bottom of the abyss of our sufferings. If I hint to you that there is a shadowy
possibility of happiness, do not think that I seek to mock affliction. But, in spite of
the dastardly and spiritless conduct of our rulers, in spite of their resolution to hu-
miliate the once great name and honour of England, in order that shopkeepers
may revel in their usurious and wicked gains, events may be too strong for the
cowards, and War may break out. I do not say that I see it looming in the
distance, but we never know what good thing is coming to us from the hand of
Providence. A collision between two fiery sea-officers may bring on a quarrel
at any moment; a reckless and insolent despatch from a petulant Foreign Minister
may rupture the hypocritical ties that unite us with an ancient enemy. Then once
more famine prices may gladden your hearths, and again the British Farmer, the
true lord and ornament of the soil, may be rewarded for his now unrecognised
labours. But we must not be sanguine, for unhappily the national mind has been
debauched,^ and the people have been taught to connect the ideas of “ peace and
happiness -the compilers of our otherwise meritorious Liturgy are partly re-
sponsible for this error, and I could wish that the Episcopal Bench would purge
our Prayer-book of those incessant petitions for peace. Gentlemen, I will not
longer dwell on the story of your wrongs, or on the faint chance of their being
redressed, but it is with a voice which trembles with sup-
pressed emotion that I call on you to drink the toast, and
it is with eyes dimmed with unbidden tears that I looks
to-wards you as you drink it—I give you “ the Memory of
Protection.”
EAYTHER TOO COOL.
Our Gladstone is an orator
To talk a dog’s hind leg off,
Or from a mastiff’s hungry jaw
A pound of butter beg off—
But not e’en Gladstone’s skill can make,
A credit of a scandal;
Or out of facts that raise a blush.
For self-praise twist a handle.
He’s free to sing the spread of trade,
Blazon commercial glories,
And set down to Whig credit all
Whereof he mulcts the Tories ;
To laud King Cotton, through each ten3e,
In future, past, and present—
E’en if some facts he’s fain to blink,
Because they’re aught but pleasant.
But when he tells us how John Bull
Has won a proud position,
Maintaining he has in the world
A mere commercial mission ;
How out of Continental pies
We’ve but to keep our digits,
To win the foreigner’s respect,
And save our trade from fidgets,
We feel an itching to demur
At thoughts of Denmark, Poland,
Of John Bull viewed askance by all.
With warm allies in no land.
Profit and loss account may stand
Better for such abstention;
But sure respect is scarce the gain
We owe non-intervention.
Or if this be respect that’s felt
In Austria or Prussia,
France, Denmark, Poland, Italy,
The Duchies, Greece or Russia,
Where England now all laugh to scorn,
Who once at England trembled,
Sure never yet was seen respect
That so contempt resembled !
“ Take care of number one ” may be
Pole-star for course commercial.
But there are lights beyond the ken
Of trading Rosse or Hersciiel.
Henceforth if shopmen’s rules must guide
The Council of the nation,
The principle should be avowed
Of counter-irritation.
The fruits of such a principle
We seem to see about us,
In nations that vituperate,
Distrust, despise, and flout us.
Nap called us “ Nation boutiquiere
We thrashed him, in requital;
But now it seems we should have bowed,
And pocketed the title.
Negative Portrait of a Finance-Minister.
In pursuance of a project suggested by Mr. M‘Lachlan,
photographer, of Manchester, for the formation of a photo-
graphic gallery or museum in which negatives should be
preserved of the portraits of great men, some negative
Kortraits of Mr. Gladstone were taken the other day by
[r. M'Lachlan, at that city. The best place, however,
for taking a negative portrait of the Chancellor of the
Exchequer would be the right honourable gentleman’s
official residence in Downing Street, the time being that
of his reply to a deputation inviting him to reduce
taxation.
PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI.
[October 29, 1864.
HOW TO TALK TO THE FARMERS.
E thought that Mr. Disraeli
had done about the boldest
thing he ever attempted in the
course of his life, when he pre-
sumed to address a meeting or
British Farmers in a cheerful
strain, and to assure them that
they were not utterly ruined.
In fact, we considered that the
right honourable gentleman
had pretty well done for him-
self by launching such an in-
sult at his friends, and that he
must be intending to abdicate
in favour of some Oppositionist
who has a finer sense of what
is due to the trampled and op-
pressed B. E. A nice hornet’s
nest he has got himself into
by his indiscretion. But in
case the author of Coningsby
should once more venture him-
self in the presence of a bu-
colic audience, we recommend
him to study the following
Model Speech, composed with
a view to the tastes of the
melancholy agriculturists :—•
Gentlemen,
Yes, let me repeat, Gen-
tlemen, for when we have lost
everything else, gentility re-
mains to console us. It is
with great melancholy pleasure
that I rise to propose the next
toast, if indeed it be not a
mockery to wreathe the flowing bowl when the cup of sorrow is so full. I will not
add to your afflictions by describing them at any length. The British Earner is
indeed, in the poet’s language,—
“ The child of misery, baptised in tears,”
and Cobden and Bright are his scowling godfathers, while Eree Trade is his cruel
godmother. There is no comfort for him, for, much as I desire to show you some
little bit of blue in the dark sky, I dare not predict that the Corn Laws will be
re-imposed in the coming Session. Still, you must remember that you are English-
men. I know, alas! too well, your sorrows and privations. I have heard of
farmers who have felt it their duty to deny themselves port wine at more than
eighty shillings, and I have within the last few days been told a harrowing story—
no, I am in no mood for jest, and I do not allude to the harrow that tears your
clods—a story of an agriculturist who has been compelled to buy an upright piano-
forte instead of a grand, for the faithful and sorrowing wife of his bosom. Other
grievous tales of distress have reached me, but I hesitate to narrate them. I know
of my own knowledge that men who have been accustomed to hunt five days in
the week now often hunt but three; and that others have been reduced to shoot
but four times where they used to shoot six. In my own parish a farmer whose
daughters have been accustomed to be instructed in singing by a fashionable
Professor who came down from London, has intimated to the poor girls that in
future they must be content with the ministrations of a circumambulant musician of
the Hebrew persuasion, and, though you will hardly believe it, the saddened father
was obliged to deny himself the happiness of taking them up to town for the first
night of Masaniello. But I will not accumulate such instances. I know that
they will arise to the individual recollections of each and all of you. But again I
say, remember that you are Englishmen, and bear your grief in manly silence. I
do not say that better times will come, but worse cannot. It is something to be at
the bottom of the abyss of our sufferings. If I hint to you that there is a shadowy
possibility of happiness, do not think that I seek to mock affliction. But, in spite of
the dastardly and spiritless conduct of our rulers, in spite of their resolution to hu-
miliate the once great name and honour of England, in order that shopkeepers
may revel in their usurious and wicked gains, events may be too strong for the
cowards, and War may break out. I do not say that I see it looming in the
distance, but we never know what good thing is coming to us from the hand of
Providence. A collision between two fiery sea-officers may bring on a quarrel
at any moment; a reckless and insolent despatch from a petulant Foreign Minister
may rupture the hypocritical ties that unite us with an ancient enemy. Then once
more famine prices may gladden your hearths, and again the British Farmer, the
true lord and ornament of the soil, may be rewarded for his now unrecognised
labours. But we must not be sanguine, for unhappily the national mind has been
debauched,^ and the people have been taught to connect the ideas of “ peace and
happiness -the compilers of our otherwise meritorious Liturgy are partly re-
sponsible for this error, and I could wish that the Episcopal Bench would purge
our Prayer-book of those incessant petitions for peace. Gentlemen, I will not
longer dwell on the story of your wrongs, or on the faint chance of their being
redressed, but it is with a voice which trembles with sup-
pressed emotion that I call on you to drink the toast, and
it is with eyes dimmed with unbidden tears that I looks
to-wards you as you drink it—I give you “ the Memory of
Protection.”
EAYTHER TOO COOL.
Our Gladstone is an orator
To talk a dog’s hind leg off,
Or from a mastiff’s hungry jaw
A pound of butter beg off—
But not e’en Gladstone’s skill can make,
A credit of a scandal;
Or out of facts that raise a blush.
For self-praise twist a handle.
He’s free to sing the spread of trade,
Blazon commercial glories,
And set down to Whig credit all
Whereof he mulcts the Tories ;
To laud King Cotton, through each ten3e,
In future, past, and present—
E’en if some facts he’s fain to blink,
Because they’re aught but pleasant.
But when he tells us how John Bull
Has won a proud position,
Maintaining he has in the world
A mere commercial mission ;
How out of Continental pies
We’ve but to keep our digits,
To win the foreigner’s respect,
And save our trade from fidgets,
We feel an itching to demur
At thoughts of Denmark, Poland,
Of John Bull viewed askance by all.
With warm allies in no land.
Profit and loss account may stand
Better for such abstention;
But sure respect is scarce the gain
We owe non-intervention.
Or if this be respect that’s felt
In Austria or Prussia,
France, Denmark, Poland, Italy,
The Duchies, Greece or Russia,
Where England now all laugh to scorn,
Who once at England trembled,
Sure never yet was seen respect
That so contempt resembled !
“ Take care of number one ” may be
Pole-star for course commercial.
But there are lights beyond the ken
Of trading Rosse or Hersciiel.
Henceforth if shopmen’s rules must guide
The Council of the nation,
The principle should be avowed
Of counter-irritation.
The fruits of such a principle
We seem to see about us,
In nations that vituperate,
Distrust, despise, and flout us.
Nap called us “ Nation boutiquiere
We thrashed him, in requital;
But now it seems we should have bowed,
And pocketed the title.
Negative Portrait of a Finance-Minister.
In pursuance of a project suggested by Mr. M‘Lachlan,
photographer, of Manchester, for the formation of a photo-
graphic gallery or museum in which negatives should be
preserved of the portraits of great men, some negative
Kortraits of Mr. Gladstone were taken the other day by
[r. M'Lachlan, at that city. The best place, however,
for taking a negative portrait of the Chancellor of the
Exchequer would be the right honourable gentleman’s
official residence in Downing Street, the time being that
of his reply to a deputation inviting him to reduce
taxation.