Punch (54.1868)

May 2, 1868.]

107

PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI.

PUNCH’S ESSENCE OE PARLIAMENT.

Monday, April 20. Easter holidays being over. Dr. Disraeli’s
young friends re-assembled, to count the weeks until Whitsuntide
holidays.

Various vacancies occur. Peers have been made, and the voices of
Sirs John WalshJBrook Bridges, and John Trollope will be heard
no more in the Nether House, Lords Ormathwaite, Fitzwalter,
and Kesteven walking into the Chamber of Peers. Sir Morton
Peto, bankrupt, has resigned Bristol, for which Miles and Morley
fight on the day Mr. Punch appears, and there be other changes.

The work began with a severe attack by Mr. Smollett on the
Madras Irrigation Company and the conduct of the Government, which
has been guaranteeing interest for ever, without taking care that the
waterworks shall last for ever, or even for any time at all, inasmuch as,
according to Mr. Smollett, the channels are so constructed as to be
of no use. Next, the Company having collapsed, Government takes
the affair into its own hands. Mr. Smollett was very severe on
everybody, and used language which does not seem out of place in
Roderick Random, but which its author’s descendant might have made
a little more decorous for the House of Commons. The Indian Minis-
ter answered, of course, and, equally of course, there was an empty
house. Who cares about watering the provinces of India ?

Mr. Watrin moved for an inquiry into the affairs of Ceylon, but he
was set upon by Mr. Adderley, whose hymn was that

“ Although the spicy breezes
Blow soft o’er Ceylon’s Isle,

And every prospect pleases,

E. Watkin has the bile.”

Then we got on Estimates, and the debates were dull, until a select
party began an attack upon Hampton Court Palace, and tried to reduce
the vote for keeping up that place. Punch is happy to say that Lord
John Manners utterly routed them. Hampton Court Palace is a
place of which the poor are particularly fond. They can get there
without much expense, there is no trouble in going in—(the artisan’s
wife seldom being afflicted with a lace parasol which has to be taken
away from her—fine ladies and cooks suffer heavily in this way), there
is no trouble in seeing all the sights, the gardens are very pretty, and

the gold fish very tame and fat, and there is no attempt to bother the
visitor by improving his mind when he only wants rest, and peace, and
fresh air.

Tuesday. Mr. Shaw Leeevre brought in a Bill for giving a wife
absolute control over her own property, or earnings, or deposits. He
mentioned that there are 3,200,000 married women in this country
working for their living—800,000 of them in trades. The Law Amend-
ment Society thinks that the law should be altered, that the wife should
retain her property after marriage, instead of its becoming the husband’s,
and that anything which she afterwards may obtain should be at her own
disposal. The Sanctity of Marriage would, of course, be appealed to,
but as that was habitually violated by settlement under Chancery
order, the objection was answered by anticipation. Mr. Mill seconded,
the motion. Mr. Punch, who never hesitates to express his opinion on
anything, from a new pin to a new planet, says that there is much
Philosophy in the view of Messrs. Lefevre and Mill. But he does
not suppose that it will find much acceptance, because there is a sort
of notion, partly derived from the usage of several thousand years,
partly from human nature, partly from theological teaching, that
somehow marriage is a little more than a mere partnership between
Edwin Jones and Angelina Brown, and that in return for Edwin’s
name, strong arm, protection, support, maintenance, fidelity, and
labour, Angelina is to become a complementary Edwin, rather than
to remain an independent Angelina. Also, the marriage service says
something about a mystical union, the conditions whereof may not
seem exactly satisfied by rival banking accounts. There are a great
many hard cases,[divers of which are the fault of people who are in such
a hurry to be married that they don’t take half the pains to inquire
into the character of a spouse which they would give to that of a
servant. But there are settlements for the rich, and protection orders
for the poor; and so long as a married couple, neither rich nor poor,
lives together, it may be for the promotion of affection that there should
be no separate interests.

After the Matrimonial Noose Question had been laid aside, we came
to the Capital Punishment Bill—the measure for making executions
private. Hereupon Mr. Gilpin rode a race upon his favourite hobby,
and delivered a long speech to show that there ought to be no execu-
tions at all. He finished with so pathetic a picture of the dying
criminal, penitent and ready for glory, but considered unfit for earth.

Yol. 54.

7