DOI issue:
August 3, 1867
DOI Page / Citation link:https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.16880#0055
MERMAIDS’ TOILETS IN ’67-
Blanche. “ I say, some of you, Call after Aunty ! She has Taken my Chignon, and Left me her horrid Black one ! ”
CAUSE AND EFFECT.
Sir Morton Peto, Crampton and Betts in tlie Bankruptcy
Court,, and money at 2 per cent, discount in the Bank of England !
As Shakspeare says, “ This effect defective comes by cause.”
Two per cent, discount means stagnation of enterprise, cessation
of labour, and paralysis of industry. Peto, Crampton and Betts in
the Bankruptcy Court means reckless financing, contractors’ lines,
gulled shareholders, £100 shares at £17, general distrust of railway
enterprises, and general disgust with railway investments. We are a
practical people. And we show it by accumulating the materials of a
gigantic and general smash for every nine years, and having the smash
in the tenth. We show it, by encouraging speculation which borders
on swindling : by floating enterprises which ruin the first generation of
their promoters ; by blowing the blubbles of trade and industry till they
burst, and bespatter everybody within range of their influence. We
proclaim it in those huge and hideous posters, which celebrate the
apotheosis of puffery and humbug on every hoarding, We build it up
into the acres of flimsy lath and plaster which disfigure every suburb,
at once a monument of the bankruptcy of bygone builders and a pur-
gatory for the discomfort of future tenants. We prove it by the much
talk and little work of our public Parliamentary labours ; the waste,
dishonesty, and friction of our Parliamentary Private Bill Legislation;
the verbiage and uncertainty of our law ; the inertia and incapacity of
our local self-government; the laissez faire of our Boards of Guardians,
District and Local Boards; the snobbery and stupidity of our Muni-
cipal Government; the rascality which goes unpunished in our retail
trade, and.expands into colossal proportions in our larger enterprise ;
our worship of successful humbug ; our neglect and contempt of fine
art; the pretension and discomfort of our private social intercourse,
and the kotowing and bombast of our public hospitality-.
In needs no M. Assolant, from the other side of the Channel, to
paint us couleur de noir. We have only to get our blacking ready, to
look at our own faces as reflected in all signs of the times, and to go to
work, with honest hands and open eyes.
IVe a practical people ! Mr. Punch denies the assumption. We are
not a practical people. We are about the most unpractical, wasteful,
thriftless, and helpless people on the face of the globe. With our
energy of temperament, our worship of money and success, our hardi-
hood of frame, and our readiness to dispense with enjoyment and stifle
conscience for considerations of profit, we ought, if we had practical
wit in anything like proportion to our will, to be what we boast to
be, but are not, the first nation of the world.
Even in our favourite Mammon worship how contemptibly we figure
as gauged by the two facts we have put in the front of this article.
Money to be had at 2 per cent., and nobody daring to use it! One of our
hugest contracting firms bankrupt with an item in the accounts which
stands £6,000,000 among the creditors’ claims, and £350,000 among
the debtors’ assets ! This is being practical with a vengeance !
A KNOTTY POINT.
What an endless discussion the Gordian knot might have provoked,
but for that sharp blade which happily cut it short! Gordias evidently
knew how to tie up his imperial property, and was well qualified to
give lessons to another distinguished personage—Hymen of matrimo-
nial celebrity—in his peculiar line. Some of his serene highness’s
most fashionable ties have lately, like Beau Brummell’s, been sad
failures.
A Correspondent, who signs himself “ Cielebs,” and who confesses
that he feels somewhat nervous when he reflects upon the inglorious
uncertainty of the law, suggests that every nuptial contract should, as
collateral security, be accompanied by a note of hand. The plan he
proposes is simplicity itself. “ Let the ring finger,” he says, “ of con-
senting beauty be tastefully tattooed with a representation of Cupid’s
emblematic dart, certain qualified officers being specially empowered to
affix the Government stamp, and piracy made punishable with trans-
portation for life. Love and confidence will then take up their abode
at the sign of the arrow, and no doubt there will soon be a great
increase in the demand for beaux.”
Ecclesiastical. —The Council of Trent.—“ Drink Bass’s bitter.”
Blanche. “ I say, some of you, Call after Aunty ! She has Taken my Chignon, and Left me her horrid Black one ! ”
CAUSE AND EFFECT.
Sir Morton Peto, Crampton and Betts in tlie Bankruptcy
Court,, and money at 2 per cent, discount in the Bank of England !
As Shakspeare says, “ This effect defective comes by cause.”
Two per cent, discount means stagnation of enterprise, cessation
of labour, and paralysis of industry. Peto, Crampton and Betts in
the Bankruptcy Court means reckless financing, contractors’ lines,
gulled shareholders, £100 shares at £17, general distrust of railway
enterprises, and general disgust with railway investments. We are a
practical people. And we show it by accumulating the materials of a
gigantic and general smash for every nine years, and having the smash
in the tenth. We show it, by encouraging speculation which borders
on swindling : by floating enterprises which ruin the first generation of
their promoters ; by blowing the blubbles of trade and industry till they
burst, and bespatter everybody within range of their influence. We
proclaim it in those huge and hideous posters, which celebrate the
apotheosis of puffery and humbug on every hoarding, We build it up
into the acres of flimsy lath and plaster which disfigure every suburb,
at once a monument of the bankruptcy of bygone builders and a pur-
gatory for the discomfort of future tenants. We prove it by the much
talk and little work of our public Parliamentary labours ; the waste,
dishonesty, and friction of our Parliamentary Private Bill Legislation;
the verbiage and uncertainty of our law ; the inertia and incapacity of
our local self-government; the laissez faire of our Boards of Guardians,
District and Local Boards; the snobbery and stupidity of our Muni-
cipal Government; the rascality which goes unpunished in our retail
trade, and.expands into colossal proportions in our larger enterprise ;
our worship of successful humbug ; our neglect and contempt of fine
art; the pretension and discomfort of our private social intercourse,
and the kotowing and bombast of our public hospitality-.
In needs no M. Assolant, from the other side of the Channel, to
paint us couleur de noir. We have only to get our blacking ready, to
look at our own faces as reflected in all signs of the times, and to go to
work, with honest hands and open eyes.
IVe a practical people ! Mr. Punch denies the assumption. We are
not a practical people. We are about the most unpractical, wasteful,
thriftless, and helpless people on the face of the globe. With our
energy of temperament, our worship of money and success, our hardi-
hood of frame, and our readiness to dispense with enjoyment and stifle
conscience for considerations of profit, we ought, if we had practical
wit in anything like proportion to our will, to be what we boast to
be, but are not, the first nation of the world.
Even in our favourite Mammon worship how contemptibly we figure
as gauged by the two facts we have put in the front of this article.
Money to be had at 2 per cent., and nobody daring to use it! One of our
hugest contracting firms bankrupt with an item in the accounts which
stands £6,000,000 among the creditors’ claims, and £350,000 among
the debtors’ assets ! This is being practical with a vengeance !
A KNOTTY POINT.
What an endless discussion the Gordian knot might have provoked,
but for that sharp blade which happily cut it short! Gordias evidently
knew how to tie up his imperial property, and was well qualified to
give lessons to another distinguished personage—Hymen of matrimo-
nial celebrity—in his peculiar line. Some of his serene highness’s
most fashionable ties have lately, like Beau Brummell’s, been sad
failures.
A Correspondent, who signs himself “ Cielebs,” and who confesses
that he feels somewhat nervous when he reflects upon the inglorious
uncertainty of the law, suggests that every nuptial contract should, as
collateral security, be accompanied by a note of hand. The plan he
proposes is simplicity itself. “ Let the ring finger,” he says, “ of con-
senting beauty be tastefully tattooed with a representation of Cupid’s
emblematic dart, certain qualified officers being specially empowered to
affix the Government stamp, and piracy made punishable with trans-
portation for life. Love and confidence will then take up their abode
at the sign of the arrow, and no doubt there will soon be a great
increase in the demand for beaux.”
Ecclesiastical. —The Council of Trent.—“ Drink Bass’s bitter.”