DOI issue:
August 27, 1870
DOI Page / Citation link:https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.16886#0102
August 27, 1870.]
PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI.
93
growth of psychological organisms into the maturity of ripened thought
and masterly action ?
"If the mind of man were a tabula rasa, ready to receive the newest
impressions and the latest fashions, working by its own activity and
relying on no extraneous agency for its supply of motive force, we
could believe, with. Smigletius and 'the solitary monk that shook
the world,' in an endless succession of elastic causations, and so solve
the problem of thought in one facile moment; but, as it is, we are left
to grope on in the dim vaults of dusty speculation, with no light bat
the flickering taper of metaphysics, with no guide but the impulse
of a wayward fancy, and with no goal beyond but the gloomy mo-
rass of human ignorance and perplexity, in which so many have lost
| their weary way, and disappeared for ever in the vain attempt to sound
| the unfathomable abyss of idea and actuality. "—Bishop Berkeley.
With this Thought, contributed by him to whom Pope gave—
'"Every Virtue under Heaven,"
Mr. Punch's Collection is complete. He has conducted Thoughts to
the " Abyss," and now they may " angle for impossibilities."
BRUCE AND BRUCE.
Scotland boasts of one Bruce. She has another Bruce, of whom,
if he follows Mr. Punch's guidance, she may boast hereafter.
The prior Bruce devoted his best attention to the national
defences of his country. The posterior Bruce, in reply to a letter
addressed to him by the Chairman of the Mersey Docks and
Harbour Board, anxiously pressing upon the Government the expe-
diency of taking measures for the immediate defence of the port of
Liverpool, promises " that should this country be unexpectedly involved
in war, the Dock Board may rest assured that due measures will be
taken for the protection of Liverpool from internal dangers or external
attack." Surely these words must have been misread by the gentleman
above referred to, in communicating them to a meeting over which he
presided. R. Bruce, truly, was one Bruce, and H. A. Bruce is
another; but the Member for Renfrewshire cannot so entirely differ
from the Scottish King but that the foregoing quotation of his lan-
guage, if correctly rendered, would read as follows:—"that lest this
country should be unexpectedly involved in war, due measures wOl,
i lie Dock Board may rest assured, be immediately taken for the pro-
tection of Liverpool," &c. Perhaps, indeed, the Secretary of State
for the Home Department applied a stronger epithet than that of
" due" to the defensive measures which he spoke about. "Measures
long overdue " may have been the phrase really employed, with an eye
to accuracy, by the Right Honourable Gentleman.
THE KNELL OF TEMPLE BAR.
Poor old Temple Bar is doomed at last, and truly they who lament
its doom are in a small and mouldy minority. Yet may Mr. Punch be
allowed to say a word in imaginary arrest of judgment on this struc-
ture, of which the City of London once boasted as one of its principal
wonders. The fact, first proclaimed by Mr. Bright, that you cannot
drive six omnibuses abreast through Temple Bar, is daily illustrated by
the retardation of vehicles owing to the attempt to drive as many as
possible. Of course this prohibits the possibility of crossing Fleet
Street for some distance to the East of its junction with the Strand.
But you have only to walk a few paces to the West, and cross the
Strand, which will do just as well, and can be done easily. The Eastern
contraction of Fleet Street impeding the traffic, lets carriages pass !
into the Western expanse of the Strand only one or two at a time ;
hence the latter space is always comparatively clear. When Temple
Bar is destroyed, the Civic Corporation will, to speak in anatomical
language, lose its Pylorus.
Mrs. Ramsbotham.
Mks. Ramsbotham says she hears that the Ruffianly Brigands of
Greece " are all bandied together. Horrible ! " She writes to her
daughter, "think of Brigands with bow legs ! I don't wonder at their
committing every specious of deformity." She adds, with respect to
her country cottage which she has recently taken, that " all the vege-
table Marys have been snivelled up by the sun. We've no peas, and
the gardener has had to cut his sticks."
" Now let's Dance, About, About."
Punch was much comforted at reading on the placards Edmond
About Safe. Bur, he was still more delighted on finding next day
that Edmond was quite safe, and enlivening Le Soir with his vivid
sketches. Edmond's health !
NATIONALIST NEUTRALITY.
Success to the French in their fight with the Teuton
For the base Saxou's own cousin-german is he.
Martin Luther, the blackguard, and Bacon, and Newton,
Them three heretics all is the limbs of one tree.
And the Sceptre of England by mar'ge is united
To the Crown that confines a proud Proteslant's brow.
May the faithful be blest and the foeman be blighted,
Though the former is getting the worst of it now !
Napoleon the Third, in our bosoms we nourish
The hope of invasion, far Oirland designed,
When sprigs of shillelagh, shall round thy head flourish;
And the sword with the shamrock so green shall be twined.
So. having destroyed the insidious formation
Of one big German people against thy command,
0 come and help us to our unification,
With an Oirish Republic for our native land.
Thy troops shall yet triumph in spite of small blunders,
Sure tiiey carry the cheesepots, and how should they tail,
As they did at Mentana, once more to work wonders ?
Och, thine Eagle, Napoleon/s the bird to prevail!
St. Patrick confounded the frogs with his sermon,
Now with haythenish reptiles as well may'st thou cope,
And into the rivers and ponds drive each German,
Nay, don't interpose, holy, iligant Pope !
INSULARITY REBUKED.
With all reverence for the memory of our forefathers, we must
admit, reviewing their estimate of foreign nations in general, and parti-
cularly their Continental neighbours, that they were extremely narrow
and illiberal. Owing to want of those facilities for international com-
munication which we enjoy, they had not contracted our cosmopolitan
feeling ; they were insular: and they failed to form a just appreciation
of the probity, if not the intelligence, of European foreigners, especially
the French and Germans. Had the words of the National Anthem
been reserved to be written in the present day, that poem could never
have included the two following verses, levelled at Sovereigns and their
Statesmen happening to have interests and to entertain views at vari-
ance with those of the British Crown :—
" Confound their politics,
Frustrate their knavish tricks.''
Duly considering the now historical project of a treaty between
France and Germany, relative to Belgium and Luxemburg, every
generous and enlightened Englishman must surely desire, that the lines
above quoted should henceforth be expunged from God Sate the Queen.
BETTER CONVICT THAN JURYMAN.
The New Act on Juries, according to the Times, contains an odd
provision. " Convicts, except outlaws, are disqualified." This excep-
tion would puzzle (Edipus. That the circumstance of being an outlaw
in addition to being a convict should redeem the disqualification
attached to a convict's character, is a mystery which no fellow, not
even he who unriddled the Sphinx, can be expected to understand.
This enactment also provides that " Jurors may be allowed a fire when
out of court, and be allowed to receive reasonable refreshment, such
i refreshment to be procured at their own expense." Really ? What a
mercy ! They are stilt lefr, subject to the useless annoyance of being
locked up together all night, tempered only with permission to buy
warmth and food out of their own pockets. The brutality with which
jurors have been wont to be treated is to be mitigated a little; but
what absolute necessity is there why they should be subjected to brutal
treatment at all? Is it de>irable that the oath whereby they are-
adjured to do their duty should be accompanied with mental impreca-
tions on their country and their country's legislature, by whom that
duty is imposed upon them, and rendered penal? Convicts are to b&
disqualified from serving as jurymen, are they? This exemption is-
enough to make a man wish that he had been a convict, in order that
he might be exonerated from the disgusting obligation of being a juror.
Joke for Gentle Dulness.
Wiggins {to Figgins). What shall you do this year, now you can't go
up the Rhine ?
Figgins. Take a cab to the Zoological Gardens, and see the Rhino-
ceros.
Spirits of Wine.—After-dinner Excitement.
PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI.
93
growth of psychological organisms into the maturity of ripened thought
and masterly action ?
"If the mind of man were a tabula rasa, ready to receive the newest
impressions and the latest fashions, working by its own activity and
relying on no extraneous agency for its supply of motive force, we
could believe, with. Smigletius and 'the solitary monk that shook
the world,' in an endless succession of elastic causations, and so solve
the problem of thought in one facile moment; but, as it is, we are left
to grope on in the dim vaults of dusty speculation, with no light bat
the flickering taper of metaphysics, with no guide but the impulse
of a wayward fancy, and with no goal beyond but the gloomy mo-
rass of human ignorance and perplexity, in which so many have lost
| their weary way, and disappeared for ever in the vain attempt to sound
| the unfathomable abyss of idea and actuality. "—Bishop Berkeley.
With this Thought, contributed by him to whom Pope gave—
'"Every Virtue under Heaven,"
Mr. Punch's Collection is complete. He has conducted Thoughts to
the " Abyss," and now they may " angle for impossibilities."
BRUCE AND BRUCE.
Scotland boasts of one Bruce. She has another Bruce, of whom,
if he follows Mr. Punch's guidance, she may boast hereafter.
The prior Bruce devoted his best attention to the national
defences of his country. The posterior Bruce, in reply to a letter
addressed to him by the Chairman of the Mersey Docks and
Harbour Board, anxiously pressing upon the Government the expe-
diency of taking measures for the immediate defence of the port of
Liverpool, promises " that should this country be unexpectedly involved
in war, the Dock Board may rest assured that due measures will be
taken for the protection of Liverpool from internal dangers or external
attack." Surely these words must have been misread by the gentleman
above referred to, in communicating them to a meeting over which he
presided. R. Bruce, truly, was one Bruce, and H. A. Bruce is
another; but the Member for Renfrewshire cannot so entirely differ
from the Scottish King but that the foregoing quotation of his lan-
guage, if correctly rendered, would read as follows:—"that lest this
country should be unexpectedly involved in war, due measures wOl,
i lie Dock Board may rest assured, be immediately taken for the pro-
tection of Liverpool," &c. Perhaps, indeed, the Secretary of State
for the Home Department applied a stronger epithet than that of
" due" to the defensive measures which he spoke about. "Measures
long overdue " may have been the phrase really employed, with an eye
to accuracy, by the Right Honourable Gentleman.
THE KNELL OF TEMPLE BAR.
Poor old Temple Bar is doomed at last, and truly they who lament
its doom are in a small and mouldy minority. Yet may Mr. Punch be
allowed to say a word in imaginary arrest of judgment on this struc-
ture, of which the City of London once boasted as one of its principal
wonders. The fact, first proclaimed by Mr. Bright, that you cannot
drive six omnibuses abreast through Temple Bar, is daily illustrated by
the retardation of vehicles owing to the attempt to drive as many as
possible. Of course this prohibits the possibility of crossing Fleet
Street for some distance to the East of its junction with the Strand.
But you have only to walk a few paces to the West, and cross the
Strand, which will do just as well, and can be done easily. The Eastern
contraction of Fleet Street impeding the traffic, lets carriages pass !
into the Western expanse of the Strand only one or two at a time ;
hence the latter space is always comparatively clear. When Temple
Bar is destroyed, the Civic Corporation will, to speak in anatomical
language, lose its Pylorus.
Mrs. Ramsbotham.
Mks. Ramsbotham says she hears that the Ruffianly Brigands of
Greece " are all bandied together. Horrible ! " She writes to her
daughter, "think of Brigands with bow legs ! I don't wonder at their
committing every specious of deformity." She adds, with respect to
her country cottage which she has recently taken, that " all the vege-
table Marys have been snivelled up by the sun. We've no peas, and
the gardener has had to cut his sticks."
" Now let's Dance, About, About."
Punch was much comforted at reading on the placards Edmond
About Safe. Bur, he was still more delighted on finding next day
that Edmond was quite safe, and enlivening Le Soir with his vivid
sketches. Edmond's health !
NATIONALIST NEUTRALITY.
Success to the French in their fight with the Teuton
For the base Saxou's own cousin-german is he.
Martin Luther, the blackguard, and Bacon, and Newton,
Them three heretics all is the limbs of one tree.
And the Sceptre of England by mar'ge is united
To the Crown that confines a proud Proteslant's brow.
May the faithful be blest and the foeman be blighted,
Though the former is getting the worst of it now !
Napoleon the Third, in our bosoms we nourish
The hope of invasion, far Oirland designed,
When sprigs of shillelagh, shall round thy head flourish;
And the sword with the shamrock so green shall be twined.
So. having destroyed the insidious formation
Of one big German people against thy command,
0 come and help us to our unification,
With an Oirish Republic for our native land.
Thy troops shall yet triumph in spite of small blunders,
Sure tiiey carry the cheesepots, and how should they tail,
As they did at Mentana, once more to work wonders ?
Och, thine Eagle, Napoleon/s the bird to prevail!
St. Patrick confounded the frogs with his sermon,
Now with haythenish reptiles as well may'st thou cope,
And into the rivers and ponds drive each German,
Nay, don't interpose, holy, iligant Pope !
INSULARITY REBUKED.
With all reverence for the memory of our forefathers, we must
admit, reviewing their estimate of foreign nations in general, and parti-
cularly their Continental neighbours, that they were extremely narrow
and illiberal. Owing to want of those facilities for international com-
munication which we enjoy, they had not contracted our cosmopolitan
feeling ; they were insular: and they failed to form a just appreciation
of the probity, if not the intelligence, of European foreigners, especially
the French and Germans. Had the words of the National Anthem
been reserved to be written in the present day, that poem could never
have included the two following verses, levelled at Sovereigns and their
Statesmen happening to have interests and to entertain views at vari-
ance with those of the British Crown :—
" Confound their politics,
Frustrate their knavish tricks.''
Duly considering the now historical project of a treaty between
France and Germany, relative to Belgium and Luxemburg, every
generous and enlightened Englishman must surely desire, that the lines
above quoted should henceforth be expunged from God Sate the Queen.
BETTER CONVICT THAN JURYMAN.
The New Act on Juries, according to the Times, contains an odd
provision. " Convicts, except outlaws, are disqualified." This excep-
tion would puzzle (Edipus. That the circumstance of being an outlaw
in addition to being a convict should redeem the disqualification
attached to a convict's character, is a mystery which no fellow, not
even he who unriddled the Sphinx, can be expected to understand.
This enactment also provides that " Jurors may be allowed a fire when
out of court, and be allowed to receive reasonable refreshment, such
i refreshment to be procured at their own expense." Really ? What a
mercy ! They are stilt lefr, subject to the useless annoyance of being
locked up together all night, tempered only with permission to buy
warmth and food out of their own pockets. The brutality with which
jurors have been wont to be treated is to be mitigated a little; but
what absolute necessity is there why they should be subjected to brutal
treatment at all? Is it de>irable that the oath whereby they are-
adjured to do their duty should be accompanied with mental impreca-
tions on their country and their country's legislature, by whom that
duty is imposed upon them, and rendered penal? Convicts are to b&
disqualified from serving as jurymen, are they? This exemption is-
enough to make a man wish that he had been a convict, in order that
he might be exonerated from the disgusting obligation of being a juror.
Joke for Gentle Dulness.
Wiggins {to Figgins). What shall you do this year, now you can't go
up the Rhine ?
Figgins. Take a cab to the Zoological Gardens, and see the Rhino-
ceros.
Spirits of Wine.—After-dinner Excitement.