Punch (59.1870)

argust 20, 1870.] PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI. 77

THOUGHTS OF GREAT MEN.

{Now first Collcc'ed.)

hen the decline of Ihe
vast, Aryan empire, long
foretold by the most,
sagacious of her his-
torians, Ptolemy Per-
tinax, long foreseen by
the most venerable of
her Archimandrites

On to Ocean's breasf,
When winds are hushed and waves are still,
And woodbine scents the window-silJ,

Then you and 1,

Beneath the sky,
Will calculate the weekly bill."

Sir John Suckling.

WOMAN "TAKING ACTION."

Under Ihe head of Sporting Intelligence, "Argus,"
Gregory Bahbatus! u entertaimn& and instructive Correspondent of the Post,

culminated to an in-
tolerable apex under
the licentious sway of
ihe last of the once
powerful Meringues,

" The action for Breach of Promise brought last week against
a member of the Ring, has, as may be imagined, caused con-
siderable amusement among that body ; and 1 hope I may he
allowed to say what the general feeling is upon the subject—-viz
vaYrTwere aU the" wdll ^at..the jury have handicapped Mr. M«««' very high ; and
mpnnt fffnT-t* nf 1 ccmsldenng what a heavy bookmaker he is, it will require a good

meant eltorts ot Kings ) man .outsiders> to win during the Octobers at Newmarket
and cavalry officers to ar- for him to recoup himself of the money, out of which the iury
rest its inevitable doom, j have done him."

" Her commerce (in i „ . . „ _ „ . . „
otto of roses) once the ! O Abgus ! Done him? A British Jury, no doubt
envy and astonishment | composed ot respectable, if not large, shopkeepers, capa-
c.f surrounding nations, I Ple' do Jou think, °* " doing," by excessively amercing
had ceased to disturb !m damages, anybody in any case, and of all cases in a
ihe equanimity of the breach of promise of marriage case ? If they gave damages
most insignificant of at a^. heavy, depend upon it the case was a very gross
neighbouring Stales ; case indeed. What! Is it not to be presumed that they
her exports and imporls : were twelve honest Englishmen, family men as well as
(of marmalade and arti- men °f business ; men, probably with grown up daughters
ficial mineral waters) : or marriageable sisters f Can you suppose that such men
yielded neither gain to WOuW encourage an extortionate action which the mere
the imperial treasury idea of bringing would shock all the good, generous, un-
nor profit to the adven- seihsh, loving girls, their relations ? Such dear girls would
turous trader • and the shudder at the thought of trying to sell themselves to a
richly-freighted shallops m.an by marrying him merely for a maintenance, of holding
that had^ floated on him to his bargain if he repented of it, and, if he broke
every sea and hoisted trying to screw money out of him. Their fathers and
the ' Combs and Brushes' in every harbour of the navigable globe, now lay silently brothers would never put a premium on heartless self-
rotting on the deserted shores of the romantic estuaries of the melancholy Sprolk. j seeking like that No, no, Abgus. ihe honourable, it
" The treasures of art, the wonders of science, the marvellous products of ?™aU» British tradesman would desptse his own daughter
inventive genius and the patent laws, reposed neglected and forgotten in galleries lf ™ suspected her of such baseness. The breadth of mind
and cabinets, in museums and mechanics' institutes—the ivories and alabasters, , and view peculiar to his class moreover enables him to
the cameos and corkscrews, the subtle work of the sculptor, the goldsmith, and i Perceive that actions for breach of matrimonial contract,
the market gardener, all at the mercy of the barbarous invader; exciting the , ought to be generally discouraged li only on prudential
cupidity and tempting the insatiable avarice of the most abandoned of her height i grounds by men wishing to get their daughters off their
and sex, and finally leading the way to that momentous disturbance of thejhands; because no man in his senses would ever marry
equilibrium of nations which terminated in the disruption of the entire Peninsula,1 any woman wno had been a plaintiff in one.
and is felt even to this day in the remotest fastnesses of the City Koad."—Gibbon. However, if any unfortunate fellow has really been, as

_ Abgus says, " done " by a jury in their verdict of damages

against him for having broken an engagement to wed a
"I wander in the meadows at eventide, I drink in the sweet scents of the person for whom he had ceased to care, there is this con-
mignonette in the fragrant hedgerows, of the Pyrus Japonica in the adjoining cop- solation for him, that the heaviest hue is preferable to the
pice, of the Myosotis palustris in the adjacent fox-cover. I stand for half an bonds of enforced matrimony. He may, besides, thank his
hour watching the sensitive blossoms of the tender orchis shrink nervously before stars that he did cease to care for one not worth caring
the first shades of approaching night, aud see the gleaming chalice of the Victoria
regia brimming with the fertilising dews of the bounteous heavens.

"Alt Nature is unobtrusively serene and still. The lapwing's carol is hushed,
and the song of the beetle-crusher has faded on the ear of listening night; the
hate is in her form, the catalpa on her mossy nest; that busy engineer, the
indefatigable mole, slumbers in his own earthworks, and the glowworm's light is
turned off at the meter. There is not a sound on the horizon, there is not a
creature in the back premises. I will retrace my steps along this secluded bridle-
path, I will tread carefully among the edible fungi on the grassy lawn—what thanks
owe the wise Professor who taught me in my boyish hours to distinguish between

for, in time. If the member of t he Ring named by Abgus
has in truth been "done " in the way which Abgus men-
tions, he should reflect that no fine is so heavy as the yoke
of slavery to that other ring which he has escaped at all
events, and which, had he not escaped it, would perhaps
make him wish that he were under the Turf instead of on it.

Song by a French. Soldier.

the delicious mushroom and the deleterious toad-stool—and return to my ten-pound < My Mitrailleuse may prove untrue ;

.enement, for the night is chilly, and I fear arthritic rheumatism, having forgotte-
ny great-coat."—Linn.eus. _

We will conclude with a quaint old madrigal:—

" When Phcebus from his couch is springing,

Curtained in the east,
When feathered throats are sweetly singing

Over Nature's feast,
Wrhen night retreats and darkness hies,
And zephyrs breathe, and Flora sighs,

Then you and I,

Beneath the sky,
Will watch the day-star ere he dies.

" When Phcebus to his bed is goiog,

For that I do not care,
If I can but depend on you,
My own Vivaudiere.

Foreign Affairs.

In the Post the other day it was thus written :—
"The British Embassy was stormed by peaceful British sub-
jects asking for passports. Paris will ere long, contain very few
foreigners."

Let us hope it may not too soon contain a great many.

question op CONTRABAND.

Shrouded in the west, Tr coals are contraband of war, why not cill the colliers,

When purling streams are swiftly flowing ! who are guilty of exporting the coals, over them P

Tcl. 59.

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