Punch (62.1872)

March 2, lb72.]

PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVAKI.

87

" WOMAN i SPARE THAT BIRD."

Men would not be what they are hut for women. Great
men have mostly been the sons of gifted mothers. The
progressive improvement or deterioration of Man will
essentially depend upon the continued ascent or deca-
dence of Woman. Elevation, in ideas of ornamental
art, from the absurdities of savage finery ever upwards
towards the expressions of perfect grace, is a visible
criterion of rising intelligence and morality. Chignons,
and many other embellishments which ladies have
adopted of late, are ominous of a noble Posterity, Among
prognostics of this kind may be mentioned certain objects
of natural history, which have recently, as the Globe
observes, come into use by way of decorations for
valentines, pincushions, and ladies' hats. To wit, the
skins of divers and sundry song and other little English
birds, namely, chaffinches, greenfinches, ordinary and
golden-crested wrens, hedge-sparrows, robins, yellow-
hammers, linnets, tomtits, and kingfishers; whereof the
last-named have been threatened with extermination,
owing to the demand for them by ladies' hatters. But
though these newly-fashionable and favourite garnitures
are certainly the tokens of a most hopeful rise in civili-
sation, that benefit is attended with this disadvantage,
that our beautiful small birds are in course of being im-
proved off the face of the earth. Therefore, it is to be
wished that our fair countrywomen would vouchsafe,
whilst not ceasing to cultivate zoology with taste, to ex-
change the ornithological specimens now in vogue for
another sort, which, whilst involving no sensible loss,
would be equally becoming; as, for example, bats,
toads, frogs, lizards, efts, snails, moths, dragon-fiies,
chafers, grasshoppers, crickets, cockroaches, and beetles.

Songs on Solemnities.

"THE UPPER TEN »

Stationary Cabby. " Hullo ! wheke ark ye Off to ?"

Second Cabby. " Home, of course. a Fouk- Wheeler is quite Respectable

enough for anybody THAT would be out on a NlGHT like this."

Sternhold and Hopkins both were poets great;

Nicholas Brady, too, and Nahum Tate :

Compared with Minstrels, in these latter days

Who pen, occasionally, songs of praise ;

Great relatively, by the like degrees

Of bulk with those from mites which distance fleas.

New Title for Old Country Dance.—"Just like
Roger-de Coverley."

tc r

THE " TUESDAY.

Advices from Venice state that the trade and manufactures of
that city had received a remarkable impetus, in consequence of the
extensive orders received from London for the far-famed Venetian
masts. In our own port, the stevedores and dock-labourers were
employed night and day, for several nights and days, in discharging
the gondolas which arrived from the Adriatic, laden with these orna-
mental poles. They were the invention of an early and artistic
Doge—the one who has left a pleasing account of the hospitality he
experienced from the Lord Mayor, in the Venetian Parlour at the
Mansion House, when he visited London on business connected with
the heavy import duty then existing on Venetian blinds.

We are glad to be able to announce that no opposition will be
offered to the payment out of the Corporation funds of the bill for
riding lessons, incurred by those members of its body who took part
in the procession on horseback. The manager of the Riding School
which they honoured with their patronage, speaks, with honest
pride, of their condescension and good humour in the midst of the
most trying circumstances; and declares that he cannot remember
ever to have had more docile and assiduous pupils. He takes credit
to himself, and deservedly so, for dissuading them from engaging
circus horses for the occasion.

Urgent private business has compelled the Lord Chamberlain
to quit town. In the hurry of departure he omitted to leave his
address: no letters, therefore, from unreasonable people, especially
those addressed in a feminine hand, can be forwarded to him.

The police executed their difficult and delicate duties in a manner
which, we are sure, cannot fail to have attracted the notice of their
superiors. At one moment it was feared that a misunderstanding,
arising out of a perambulator which evinced a disposition to defy
the carriage regulations published in the papers several days pre-
viously, might have led to awkward complications ; but, happily, it
blew over without assuming any more serious proportions than the
loss of a little temper and some varnish.

The animals in the Zoological Gardens were fed twice.

The strict limitations under which ladies' tickets were issued to
the two Houses of Parliament have, we regret to learn, brought a
host of troubles in their train which only the hand of time can allay.
Several matrimonial engagements have been broken off, and letters
and presents mutually returned; and one Member writes to tell us
that a breach has arisen between himself and his aunt, the possessor
of vast property, unencumbered, and entirely at her own disposal,
which he fears can never be healed.

The Tichborne Jury would have enjoyed the day immensely^ but
for the untoward circumstance that one of the shorthand writers
engaged on the trial occupied a seat close to those they had secured.
This so painfully reminded them of what they have still to undergo,
that even the sight of the Common Councilmen on horseback, in
their mazarine gowns, failed to kindle a smile on their jaded faces.

Statistics, carefully compiled, leave no doubt that the greatest
amount of contentment and satisfaction, on the twenty-seventh,
was experienced by those loyal subjects who enjoyed "an unin-
terrupted view of the whole length of the Old Bailey."

Mr. Punch regrets that in the pressure of business last week, it
did not occur to him to supply some trustworthy information respect-
ing St. Paul's. He has been distressed beyond measure to learn that
in the conversations of well-dressed and seemingly refined persons
(many of them in high-priced seats) on Tuesday last, an amount of
ignorance broke out which he has thought it his duty to communi-
cate to the Committee of Privy Council on Education. He will,
therefore, content himself in this place with remarking that St.
Paul's is not a noble specimen of Gothic architecture, that it was not
the work of Sir Inigo Jones, that Sir Christopher Wren was
never a Royal Academician, and that the Cathedral was not burnt
to ashes by the Puritans under the command of Oliver Crom-
well, and rebuilt by Queen Anne's Bounty—an act of munificence
on the part of that Sovereign which the people of London commemo-
rated by subscribing for her statue, still a conspicuous ornament of
the area in front of the sacred edifice.