Punch (66.1874)

January 17, 1874.] PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI.

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WASTE OF MATERIAL.

Ritualistic Mistress. ‘ ‘ How did you like the Service this Morning,
Mary ?

Little Low-Church Maid. “Well, M’m, I can’t say I liked it much.
Would you believe it, M’m, though there were three Ministers, not

ONE OF THEM COULD PREACH A SERMON ?”

[Mistress wonders what is the proper answer, but then, considering that her Hair
is of more importance than her Maid's opinions, directs that the Toilet be
proceeded with.

BEST SIGN OE THE SEASON.

Of the mildness of the Season
Many a pretty proof we ’ve seen;
Blossoms plnm and apple trees on,
Daisies blooming on the green,
Primroses and periwinkles,

Violets, too, on banks that blow,

Hard by where the sheep-bell tinkles,
Lambkins bleat, and heifers low:

Birds that raise untimely voices ;

Song and missel thrush that sing,

So as when their kind rejoices
O’er a fine fat slug in spring.

Toads and frogs, from winter’s slumber,
Which on sunny days awake ;

Ere a few more hours they number
They may find out their mistake.

South-west wind, a green Yule blowing,
Fatten churchyard though it should,
Late mild weather in bestowing
Is a wind that blew us good.

Blew the Bing down, which awaited
Bitter winter ; bless their souls !

Kept demand back, and abated,
Prosperous gale, the price of coals.

Of all tokens of the present,

Or the recent, season mild,,

This one is the sign most pleasant;

Grate with cheaper fuel piled.

’Tis the best in Country papers
Mentioned, copied thence by Town,
Making them that read cut capers ;

Yews that coals are going down.

American English.

The Yankees are said to have lately coined another
new word to express the act, sometimes committed even
in the United States, of a man who kills his wife. They
call it “uxoricide.” This is better than most of their
additions to the Dictionary. They might have denomi-
nated wife-slaughter conjugicide ; which would have
been ambiguous. “Uxoricide,” having been estab-
lished as a current expression, must of course be
balanced with a name to signify the converse deed,
which, by parity of nomenclature, will be termed
mariticide.

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SEPULTURE AND SENTIMENT.

People accustomed to regard the question of choice between
“cremation” and interment sentimentally, might as well consider
what it amounts to in the view of enlightened sentiment. It is simply
the question whether there is anything more disagreeable in the im-
mediate than there is in the gradual decomposition of organic remains.
By cremation, properly managed, all the constituents of the thing
burnt, except the earthy particles, are sent in gaseous forms up a
tall chimney into the atmosphere, and the skies. In case of inter-
ment they leak out partly as gases into the surrounding air, which
you breathe ; partly as liquids into the neighbouring earth; thus
into any wells you may have sunk therein: and so into the water
which you drink.—Which of these alternative conditions of things
does Sentiment deem the nicer ? If Sentiment approve of a wine that
I contains some body, is it equally partial to water capable of the
; same description? Can Sentiment be pleased to see commons and
open spaces progressively converted into cemeteries ; and, if not, how
I does Sentiment relish the prospect of their ultimate abolition which
must result from the continual spread of population on a limited
j area ? The spirits of the wise may well sit in the clouds and mock
us ; for there they are where their bodies ought also to be, resolved
into their innoxious elements instead of entering into the lungs and
j digestive organs of those who persist in putting corruptible matter
in the wrong places. There are Ch irches in which, surrounded as
they are by crowded churchyards, memento mori is addressed now
and then to the ear indeed, but always to the nose. Cremation ap-
! pears to be called for with forcible demonstrations by those who
want it. The dead are at least doing all they can to force their
claims on our attention.

THE SHAME OE STROUD.

0 help, Thomas Moore, here’s a sin and a shame,

Lend a hint from the verse you indignantly writ
When John Russell, fatigued with political game,
Thought of turning philosopher, poet, or wit.

Says you—and uncommonly handsome you wrote—

“ Thou, born of a Bussell, whose instinct to run

The accustomed career of thy sires”-need we quote

That elegant bit about “ eagle and sun ” ?

But Thomas, 0 Thomas, what, what shall we say
To a borough that should be eternally proud
That your Bussell sat for it—and yet goes astray—

0 what shall be done to the Voters of Stroud ?

With the broad Ajax-shield of the Ballot on high
(Periphrastic, you know, Tom, for ‘telling a story’),

Bad Stroud has slunk sneaking, so slavish and sly,

Anri where Russell hath sat there is sitting a Tory !

Like—bother a simile, usually lame—

Let this sentence proceed from the Populi Vox,

“ We’ll speak not, we’ll trace not, we’U breathe not its
name—

The name of base Stroud. Let it sleep in the—Box ! ”