Punch (51.1866)

02

PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI.

[September 8, 1866

MISS LAVINIA BROUNJONES.-No. 4.

■The Model proves Refractory !

THE BRUMMAGEM ROUGH TO THE TOTNESS
RESPECTABLE.

Come down, Respectability—

Come down out of that gig, Sir ;

At Yarmouth, Reigate, Totness,

We’ve seen you run your rig, Sir.

You ’re a nice chap, you are, to scoff
At radical and rough, Sir ;

Pitch left and right into John Bright,

And middle-class rights puff, Sir.

Whose hands are dirtiest, yours or mine ?

Which of our dirts is cleanest?

Which bows down at the lowest shrine,

Which of our means is meanest ?

I may be too fond of big words,

Better big words than bribes, Sir :

Are Demagogues much fouler birds
Than Pharisees and Scribes, Sir ?

Your ten-pound shop, your smooth brush’d crop,
Your broad-cloth and your beaver,

Be’t ne’er so wide, won’t serve to hide
Bribe-giver or receiver.

Town after town, shame hunts you down,

Dirty, dirt-eating varmints,

Upsets your gig, and inside out
Alike turns masks and garments.

Let honest folk, who crane or croak,

For fear of us, the millions—

Say which they’d sooner trust, the coach
To drive, or ride postilions ?

Fellows like these, who buy and sell
Constituents like cattle,

Or the sort we trust, p’raps too well.

In our cause to do battle ?

“ I THINK, HERE BE TRUTHS.”

England’s Mission is to tell the truth to all sorts of people. Her
sons are seldom deficient in the will and the courage necessary to this
end. We think that a stronger evidence of the fact has seldom been
given than on a recent occasion by the Italian Special Correspondent
of the Daily Telegraph. All his senses outraged by the atrocious un-
cleanhness of an inn at Bergamo, Mr. Sala expressed his opinions to
the landlord. This fellow—

“ Was insolent enough to tell me that the incredibly horrible nature of his
domestic arrangements was thought good enough for Italians, and pari passu,
ought to suit English people. But I told him that his inn could not have been
intended for Italians, whom I respected as a noble and intelligent people, seeing
that his house was fit only for skunks and swine, of whom I added, by way of a
compliment, he was one. Whereat he looked as though he would have stabbed me,
but ultimately subsided into a kitchen.”

As Peter Pindar said, wbeu his satires on King George the.
Third were thought rather too emphatic, “ It is of no use whipping
, pigs with velvet.” There be also hostelries nearer home, in which,

- non obstante the cant about the perfection of British inns, and in
defiance of the hack quotation from Shenstone, some such mild
remonstrance might not be undeserved. But it is desirable that the
J administrator should be prepared with the British fist to back up the
British criticism. We speak as those who have been bitten, over-
charged, cheated, and insulted, and who have read the above extract
1 with a vengeful pleasure.

The Medical Officer’s Friend.

We understand that the Surgeons of the United Kingdom contem-
plate getting up a subscription for a testimonial, as valuable as they
can afford, to be offered to the Duke of Cambridge, in acknowledg-
ment of the earnest and successful efforts which his Royal Highness
has ever made to uphold the position and maintain the rights of medical
officers, and altogether to promote, as highly as possible, the efficienC
of the Medical Department of the British Army.