Punch (55.1868)

December 5, 1868.]

PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI.

237

Some I remember who still wore
Pigtails and powder, long unknown.

And they had seen, they said and swore,
Young days yet better than my own.

It seems, if back and back we go.

Till Adam first walked flowers among,

The farther back the better, so.

The days, from those when 1 was young.
Sing, &c.

When some museum shall contain
This rare brass-buttoned coat of blue,
Young fellows, there may still remain,

Then queer old fogies, some of you.

And they, to mind when they recall
The bells at this election rung,

May say, “ These times are not at all
Like those old days when we were young.”
Sing, &c.

CONCERNING SCOTLAND.

^ E Banks and Braes o’ bonny Doon,
and all other portions of Northern
England, sometimes called Scot-
land, perpend. Scotland has
elected no fewer than five
Englishmen at this general choos-
ing. Of course, England has
generously overpaid the courtesy,
but that is matter of course. We
in the South, when we find a
shrewd, honest, accomplished
candidate before us, do not des-
cend to the provincialism of ob-
jecting to him because he happens
to be a Scot; but hitherto Scot-
land has been much less British.
We applaud her advance. Sykes,
Bouverie, Trevelyan, Par-
ker, and Waterlow are the
chosen five. In the last case the
liberality of the Scots shines out
with preternatural effulgence, for
Sir Sydney Waterlow is that
thing which the wuts of the North
(in abject imitation of Wilson’s
fun of other days) declare to be a most pitiable creature, a Cockney. More-
over, he is an Alderman. Of course, this could not be forgotten on the
hustings. “ A Cockney Alderman, who knows nothing of Scotland,
has been brought away from his turtle and champagne, to disturb our
representation.” However, the Cockney Alderman came in triumph-
antly, even though, as has been pathetically remarked, he did not show
the quickness of Mr. Parker, and learn up a bit of Burns. He
might as well have taken this trouble, as his doing so would have
afforded an innocent pleasure to the electors, and one of Burns’s best
songs is specially connected with the shire Sir Sydney represents.
Who forgets the “ Dumfries Volunteers ” ?

“ The wretch that would a tyrant own,

And the wretch, his true sworn brother,

Who ’d set the ruob above the throne,

May they be (big drum) together !

Who will not sing ‘ God Save the King '

Shall hang as high’s the steeple,

But while we sing ‘ God Save the King,’

We ’ll ne’er forget the people.”

Sir Sydney Waterlow begs us to say that he meant to have given
this, ore rotundo, from the hustings, and will do so on his re-election.
In the meantime, and by way of a reward to the Dumfries men for
having despised the old-fashioned cant about Cockneys, Mr. Fundi
informs Scotland generally that Sir Sydney YVaterlow is^ about as
like the typical London Alderman, who “ wallows in turtle ” (as dear
old Sibthorp used to say of the Whig Ministers), as Ben Nevis is like
I Primrose Hill. He is, personally—Mr. Punch’s right to personality is
a divine right—a tall and handsome man, who would look very well in
the garb of old Gaul; nextly, he is a travelled gentleman, and, whatever
he may know about Scotland, knows a deal about the East; and, finally,
he is an energetic labourer in the good work of improving the dwellings
of the humbler classes. Mr. Punch is not much in the habit ol praising
people, remembering Sir Peter Teazle’s dictum thereanent; but the
exceeding good behaviour of Scotland upon the present occasion merits
guerdon. Punch bides by the Buff and the Blue, when the Burners
who sport it are True Blue.

IpOg-AlM/I DTE -Ti?£-0Cl7X

PUNCH’S DREAM OP 1868.

Once when prophets were loud on the changes to be,

After England had taken her Leap in the Dark-
How tails in the places of heads we should see,

And strange creatures gathered in YVestminster’s Ark,

I, Punch, dreamed a dream*, which I hear has come true—
How nought was so like the Old House as the New.

Her Leap in the Dark, they say, England has taken,

^And, as far as she knows, found no mischief therefrom:
Not e’en shooting Niagara seems to have shaken
John Bull’s constitution, in spite of old Tom.

And those who count heads or count noses, aver,

That the New House’s motto will be, “ As you were ! ”

One change we shall see—“ ins ” and “ outs ” shifting sides,
But its heads won’t be fuller, its pockets less full;

Some sense it will lack, and some nonsense besides;

More decorous it may be, it must be more dull.

We may miss the good work that a Bruce might have done.
Or, when flat, sigh for Bernal to poke us some fun.

So they say : so I said : and I thought of my dream,

And on Poor Humanity’s text, “ As you were
And pond’ring that text for my next sermon’s theme,

Ere I knew it, had dozed off again in my chair,

And with my head running on things old and new,

Dreamed again, and I ’ll tell you my Dream number two.

Methought that I walked in a wood wild and wide,

Where many men walked, among pathways that spread
In maze labyrinthine, on every side,

And this way and that way those wanderers led :

But so devious the tracks, and the pathways so crost,

No wayfarer tried them but soon he seemed lost.

Now hither now thither, now forward now back,

I saw them still stumbling, and blund’ring along :

Yet none would confess he had strayed from the track,

But declared himself right, other wayfarers wrong :

And to hard words and even to blows they would fall
O’er a “ whither ” and “ whence ” that was myst’ry to all.

Oh, many the pit-fall where wayfarers fell,

And were smothered, or struggled, half choked, back to air,
And many the furze-brake and thorn-guarded dell

Where they stuck, sunk, or scrambled, all bleeding and bare.
Yet now and again would these wand’rers form bands,

And cheer and halloo, and as comrades join hands.

Till it happed -while I watched, how to left hand and right
The tumbling, and stumbling, and blundering went on,

Of a clearing those wand’rers had struggled to sight.

Still at odds with each other which way they had gone :

Some declaring ’twas forward, and some that ’twas back,

A.nd each chiding the other for blocking the track.

But now when they met at this clearing, behold,

Under two heads the wand’rers confusedly drew—

And the downcast grew cheerful, the cowards grew bold,

As no pitfalls they’d ’scaped, and no thorns struggled thro’—
And all sung in a chorus, complacent and clear—

“ Our wand’rings are ended— our haven is here ! ”

“ They told us the road that we took led to woe,

That darkness and danger surrounded our way ;

But we went on, nor heeded the warning, and lo !

We have found pleasant places, and fair light of day;
Nought is changed save for better: Earth’s Eden is here:
Then Halloo—boys Halloo ! Of the wood we are clear! ”

Then I saw in my dream, how surrounding the wood,
Where those wayfarers halted to raise that halloo,
Yague shapes, lovely some, and some terrible, stood—
But of all, fair or fearful, was none that I knew.

“ And be they for evil,” I thought, “ or for good,”

“ You were best not halloo, till you’re out of the wood ! ”

* See Punch for May 25, 1867

“ No working-men Members were there:
Save the spouters’ no fustian I saw:

No Shop-Solons, hand-labour to crown,
And bring capital under its law.

“ No more mighty thinkers : no more
Wondrous orators : as many bores :
Muddlers, Meddlers, and Millionnaires :
Directors, place-hunters by scores.

“No more palpable wisdom I found
In Reform’s new-quintessence sub-
limed :

Not cleaner or harder their hands,

Who Democracy’s ladder had climbed.

“ In short, ’twas amazing to find,—

One feels loath the result to avow—
How uncommonly like at most points,
Was the new House to that we have
now.