Punch (60.1871)

Januaby 28, 1871.] PUNCH, OE THE LONDON CHAEIVAEI. 31

" WATER-PIPES."

paterfamilias's song of the frost.

Air—" Cherry Ripe."

" Water-pipes, water-pipes, pipes," I cry!
" Been and busted ! " Low and High.
If I ask the housemaid, "Where ? "
She will answer, " Here, and there,—
Here and there and everywhere."

Whence theycome, and where they go,
Is just the thing I want to know ;
But I don't, and that is why
" Plumber! Plumber ! " is the cry.
Plumber ! Plumber! left and right;
Plumber ! Plumber! day and night.

Why are you and I such fools

As submit to Builders' rules ?

You and I, my friend, and all,

High and Low, and great and small ?

One thing Builder understands—

How to play in Plumber's hands :

And for one thing Builder cares—

To leave openings for " repairs : "

So loose tiles and slates defends,

Drains that finish in " dead ends,"

Tanks and boilers safe to leak,

Chimneys warranted to reek ;

Doors and windows placed with craft,

Still to catch you in a draught;

Green-wood panels in the doors,

Warping new deal in the floors;

Pipes that run just where they shouldn't,

And bm'st each frost. 0, if they wouldn't!

THE CAMPBELLS ARE COMING!

First Swell (in, great-coat). "Hollo, Fwed ! What at? Extraordinary
Costume !"

Second Swell (in tartan). " Ya-as, rather Neat and Appropriate, I fancy,
as a Loyal Subject and all that Sort of Thing."

Feminine Phraseology.

One species of refinement, at least, is highly cidtivated
in girls' boarding-schools — a peculiar rennement of
diction. An euphemism admirably in keeping with that
verbal nicety, one wbich has not been as yet inculcated
by governesses at Seminaries for Young Ladies, would
be that of calling mutton-pie mutton-tart.

economy and extravagance.

By Blood and Iron Bismarck wins, behold!
But conquest always costs us Blood and Gold.

STBAWBERKY LEAVES.

a selection from the very latest letters of the honourable
horace walpole, of strawberry hill. favoured by our
private spiritual medium.

To Sir Horace Mann.

Anything that you tell me, my dear Sir, I receive with an interest
which you will understand better than any one else. But what will
you have ? Frankly, I care very little for anecdotes of hypocrisy.
The world is teUing them to me all day long, and a good part of the
night into the bargain. Did you ever hear of the Tzeremisch Tar-
tars ? I do not believe you if you say that you did. But hear this.
They have no particular religion, and they have an odd way of
excusing the fact. They say that they once had a religious book for
their guidance, but one day a cow came and ate it. Many folks
whom you and I know have not the excuse of the cow.

Why are you surprised at that strange piece of scandal having
been kept from society so long as vou say it has ? In that charming-
play, Le Due Job, there is a delightful word on the subject. A
secret need not be respectable, to be respected. Now that it has come
out, who is the worse, except those who have no longer the private
happiness of having a spiteful tale to reveal ?

I met your friend X. (I omit the name—envelopes, like the rest of
creation, yield to steam) at a dinner. He sat near me, and rather
pleased me while he spoke only to his neighbours. But when he
wished to be heard all over the table, he had the bad habit which
shows a man not accustomed to be listened to for his own sake. He
began with some paradox, or something intended to startle. This
sort of^thing should be left to a certain land of preachers, who, I am
told, find it attract vulgarians—the vulgar mind loves surprises.
X. has plenty of time before him, and may take his social position
without jumping from spring-boards. Samuel Rogers, the poet, had
a valid excuse for his uncomforting talk. "My voice is very feeble,"

he observed, "and unless I said disagreeable things, no one would
attend to me." My dear Sir, imagine a man's caring about the at-
tention of a table full of persons for whom he cares nothing !

Your Italians affect great interest in commercial things; once they
were splendid merchants, and the affectation is not ungraceful. At
all events, it is better than that of our half-breeds, who pretend to
think that anything mercantile is beneath their notice. The word
bankrupt came from Italy, a fact you can preface to the little story
I am going to tell you. If I tell it wrongly, it is from no assump-
tion of ignorance ; but I believe I have it _ right. A man forged a
bill on a well-to-do tradesman. He got wind of this, and warned
his bankers not to pay it. They naturally asked to see a list of the
paper he had out. They saw so much, that they closed his account,
and he was ruined—if any man can be ruined in these days.

We have no election battles lighting at present. The Radical got
himself turned out of Norwich because the Whig's agent bribed a
man, and Whig and Radical having coalesced, the Law tinned the
latter out. But do not talk to me of elections. They are tame
things in these days. In my time they were either the most gentle-
manly arrangements conceivable (a borough-holder returned you con-
ditionally on your never going near his borough, lest you distiubed
the faith in his authority), or they were ferocious battles, that ruined
a couple of families. Also there was humour about them. Even so
lately as the Liverpool Election, when George Canning, Lord Sefton,
and General Gascoigne stood, in 1818, I remember we "laughed
consumedly." For whenever the Liberals nut up a Sham Candidate,
the Tories did the same, and before the fight was over there were
eighteen Shams. The Clubs never venture on sending down more
than one or two, now, and this with fear and trembling, for some-
times the sham man walks in, to the confusion of all decorous
bribery and corruption.

I shall write nothing about the War, but if you want to see how
the ivhirligig of Time brings about his revenges, look at this. In 1806
Prussia made war upon France. What did Napoleon say ?—

'' I am innocent of this war, I have nowise provoked it; it did not