Punch (60.1871)

May 20, 1871.]

PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVAEL

199

A POSITIVE FACT.

Victim (inspecting his Negative). " H'm !—arery Good. But d' ye Think my

A PUBLIC-HOUSE PiEAN.

(Wittler's Licence—to be continued.)

Hurrah, hurrah, for " Wested Rights,"

The Flag that through a thousand tights

Has hraved the battle and the breeze,

Its legend " Do what we dem please ! "

The Licence of the Licensed Wittier

Shall be made larger and not littler.

So bring the biggest hogshead out,

Of hocussed beer, and salted stout,

And drink " Long live the Wittlers' licence"—

(Which words I uses 'em in my sense.)

Why shouldn't parties mix their liquor,

Which some likes thin, and some likes thicker ;

Some likes it smaller, and some stiffer,

And taps, like tastes, in course must differ ?

The Truth this here 's about the size on—

"What's one man's drink's another's p'ison."

Then please your tastes and fill your glasses,

And drink the true 'oines of the masses.

Wich—ax the 'usbands, not their spouses—

If Public's 'omes ain't Public 'ouses !

So draw your liquor with an 'ead—

The wicked Licence Bill is dead !

And toss your tipple o'er your tongue—

The Bruce knocks under to the Bung !

The Bill and the Payers

It is not for our feast bespoke

That we object the cost to bear,
When, laden with an equal yoke,

Each has to stand his proper share.
'Tis when the fare we ordered not,

But others, and on us you call,
The lesser number of the lot,

To pay the bill, and pay it all.

Hair has come out Well?" Income-tax?

a cabinet question.

G<m<:«NT, Ministers with nothing to live upon but their
precarious earnings, how long would it be before they
would discover the possibility of a substitute for the

SEVERITY OF THE SESSION.

Unsparing- retrenchment has reduced numerous clerks and
labourers to pauperism. Extraordinary estimates have been met by
necessarily heavy, but unnecessarily partial and grievous, taxation.
The liberty of individuals is threatened by legislation influenced by
Sabbatarian teetotallers. Anxiety and distress have been inflicted !
on thousands of struggling families, and very large numbers of j
persons are made more or less miserable by accomplished or immi- '
nent Acts of Parliament.

Example may teach people to bear the afflictions which they ex-
perience under the hands of a chastening Government with fortitude.
The Legislature, which has impoverished them, and menaces their
comforts and enjoyments, would set them that example by volun-
tarily submitting themselves to a certain severity of self-denial
which would be particularly seasonable. Accordingly, perhaps
Mr. Gladstone will invite the House of Commons, with a view to
the despatch of unpleasant public business, to forego, for this year,
their accustomed observance of that special parliamentary holiday,
the Derby. Or, should our good Premier feel reluctant thus to
exhibit himself in the character of an austere pedagogue, his genial
Chancellor of the Exchequer will doubtless be only too happy
to deliver his proposal of no Derby holiday for him in the quality of
Usher. Perhaps, to make it the more gracious, Bob Matchbox will
point it with a Latin joke.

Ninnies at Full Length.

Let us cease to call the confiscation of Sixpence in the pound out
of some people's incomes, the Income-tax. If we call it a tax at all,
instead of calling it a robbery, let us term it the Nincom-tax. Thus
we shall characterise, with an elegant abbreviation, the class of
persons who quietly endure it.

Sporting Sailors.—"Epsom Salts."

THE PREMIER ON THE BEAUTIFUL.

On his legs at the Royal Academy Dinner, Mr. Gladstone spoke,
and said:—

" Wo live in times when the extraordinary activity of the human mind in
regard to all material pursuits more and more demands the counterpoise of
steady and sedulous cultivation of all that pertains to the true culture of the
human spirit. That study of beauty—I might venture to say, without fear
of being misunderstood, that worship of beauty—to which your vocation calls
you, is among the most powerful of those counteracting means to which we
must look to check the tendency of mankind to become in an increasing
degree the slaves of mere material purposes and enjoyments."

Hear, hear! One way in which Artists study beauty, or, we may
venture to say without fear of being misunderstood, worship beauty,
is that of surveying beautiful landscapes with a studious eye
in order to paint them. How will this study of beauty be
possible when the scenery which constitutes beautiful landscapes
shall have been wholly destroyed, as it is in course of being by the
Progress which keeps on improving it off the face of the earth ?
Hear, our Premier. If scenery is worth painting, much more is it
worth preserving; and is not what is true of the flora equally true of
the fauna f Hooray for Gladstone ! The Statesman has spoken
out, encouraged, evidently, by a late Division relative to an open
space, threatened with enclosure by Philistines. He means to check
the tendency which has been exhibited by Ministers to become in an
increasing degree the slaves of mere material purposes and enjoy-
ments. The New Forest Bill has been abandoned. All the remain-
ing beauty of Epping Forest, let us hope, will be spared too.

Progress and Peace.

The French, borne back from cutting German throats,
Forthwith set to at cutting one another's ;

Indeed all recent history denotes

At what a rate mankind are growing brothers.