DOI issue:
April 25, 1874
DOI Page / Citation link:https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.16938#0175
“A REAL EASTER AMUSEMENT.”
“ Master is very Sorry, Ma’am, but he’s got such a Dreadful Toothache he can’t see any Patients to-Day!”
“betting1,” that is sanctioned by Society, but “ betting-houses,”
the low haunts where low rogues tempt low fools into low turf
transactions—‘high’ and ‘low’makes such a difference, you see,
—and Mr. Morley’s Bill, for remedying an oversight introduced
by the Lords in amending the Married Woman’s Property Act,
which exempted the lady’s pre-nuptial property from liability for her
pre-nuptial debts.
And then on Thursday, was produced the exciting drama
of THE BUDGET—to the most crowded House of the Season.
Here is a brief analysis of what we think we are safe as describing
as a great success for Sir Stafford Northcote, Bart., the ingenious
and ingenuous author :—
The piece opens with a Prologue, entitled “ Expenditure,” in
which we are introduced to those very familiar personages, Debt,
Consolidated Fund, Army and Navy, Civil Service, Post-Office,
Packet Service, Telegraphs, and Collection of Revenue. Their
united incomes rise to the imposing dimensions of £72,503,000.
Act I. introduces a new figure—“Estimated Revenue”—who, in
a struggle with Expenditure, comes out victorious. Estimated
Revenue is the father of the child, whose fortunes give the leading
interest to the night’s performance—Surplus, a lusty young giant of
Six Millions !
In Act II. the Author deals with the efforts of various rival
powers—Indian Famine and English Fatness, Beer, Malt, Railways,
&c., &c.— to get possession of Young Surplus, or to divide his wealth
among them.
In Act III. we have the division of the spoil. Debt gets half a
million; Local Taxation, for his children, Lunatics, Police, and
Government Buildings’ Rating, a million and a quarter; Income-
tax, close on two millions (by remission of one of the four pennies
now levied); Sugar, two'millions full; and Horse Duty half a million.
The piece concludes with a general dance of the Relieved Indus-
tries, while the Disappointed Claimants—Beer, Malt, & Co.— scowl,
dissatisfied and discomfited, in the background. Though there were, of
course, some dissentient voices, we are bound to state that on Thurs-
day night the concluding tableau of Sir Stafford’s neat and inof-
fensive production brought down the Curtain to general applause.
Friday.—After notices and questions miscellaneous, the answers
to which showed what a vast deal the Government must have
under consideration, Mr. Baillie Cochrane called attention
to the Widows and Servants of Civil Servants, for whom the State
makes no provision by way of pension. Mr. Cochrane quoted
some hard cases of the kind, and there are hut too many in the Civil
Service as well as out of it. But the last sentence of the Chancellor
of the Exchequer’s answer contains the pith of the matter :—
“ The proper system to adopt is to pay our servants fairly and liberally for
the work they are called upon to do, and leave them to make their own pro-
visions for those they leave behind them.”
This, in or out of the House, comes home to common sense—so no
wonder Mr. Cochrane took nothing by his motion, much as kindly
feeling may have to say for it. Hard cases, it is said, make bad
law. They are just as likely to make bad laws, if too sympatheti-
cally listened to. The House must be hard of head, and, on occa-
sion, hard of hearing at the ear where Counsellor Kind-Heart is
whispering while Counsellor Common-Sense whispers to a very dif-
ferent purpose in the other.
Mr. Brassey has Punch's thanks for his speech on the Royal
Naval Reserve, and the expediency of doing something to strengthen
the ties between Merchant Service and Navy. He pointed out the
means by which more hoys might be trained for the Merchant Ser-
vice more of our fishermen attached to the Coast Defence Force, and
the Naval Reserves more efficiently stimulated and better looked after.
Mr. Brassey speaks sense on a very weighty. subject. The diffi-
culty is to get the true blue Navy officer to believe in the Merchant
sailor; to keep the Admiralty from, more or less, pooh-poohing
Loudon and Liverpool, Tyne and Thames, Clyde and Mersey, and
their rough-and-ready “ folks’le hands.”
Mr. Goshen denied the existence of any such feeling on the part
of the late Government, and Mr. Ward Hunt on the part of the
present. Punch rejoices to hear that we added 2000 to our Naval
Reserve in the course of last year, and that it now stands at 13,000.
But why is it not three times as large ?
Mr. M‘Gregor, for the Mercantile Marine, disclaimed any preju-
dice against the Naval Reserve.
Captain Price showed how the Reserve’s drill might he improved ;
Sir John Hay how its numbers and efficiency might he increased by
“ Master is very Sorry, Ma’am, but he’s got such a Dreadful Toothache he can’t see any Patients to-Day!”
“betting1,” that is sanctioned by Society, but “ betting-houses,”
the low haunts where low rogues tempt low fools into low turf
transactions—‘high’ and ‘low’makes such a difference, you see,
—and Mr. Morley’s Bill, for remedying an oversight introduced
by the Lords in amending the Married Woman’s Property Act,
which exempted the lady’s pre-nuptial property from liability for her
pre-nuptial debts.
And then on Thursday, was produced the exciting drama
of THE BUDGET—to the most crowded House of the Season.
Here is a brief analysis of what we think we are safe as describing
as a great success for Sir Stafford Northcote, Bart., the ingenious
and ingenuous author :—
The piece opens with a Prologue, entitled “ Expenditure,” in
which we are introduced to those very familiar personages, Debt,
Consolidated Fund, Army and Navy, Civil Service, Post-Office,
Packet Service, Telegraphs, and Collection of Revenue. Their
united incomes rise to the imposing dimensions of £72,503,000.
Act I. introduces a new figure—“Estimated Revenue”—who, in
a struggle with Expenditure, comes out victorious. Estimated
Revenue is the father of the child, whose fortunes give the leading
interest to the night’s performance—Surplus, a lusty young giant of
Six Millions !
In Act II. the Author deals with the efforts of various rival
powers—Indian Famine and English Fatness, Beer, Malt, Railways,
&c., &c.— to get possession of Young Surplus, or to divide his wealth
among them.
In Act III. we have the division of the spoil. Debt gets half a
million; Local Taxation, for his children, Lunatics, Police, and
Government Buildings’ Rating, a million and a quarter; Income-
tax, close on two millions (by remission of one of the four pennies
now levied); Sugar, two'millions full; and Horse Duty half a million.
The piece concludes with a general dance of the Relieved Indus-
tries, while the Disappointed Claimants—Beer, Malt, & Co.— scowl,
dissatisfied and discomfited, in the background. Though there were, of
course, some dissentient voices, we are bound to state that on Thurs-
day night the concluding tableau of Sir Stafford’s neat and inof-
fensive production brought down the Curtain to general applause.
Friday.—After notices and questions miscellaneous, the answers
to which showed what a vast deal the Government must have
under consideration, Mr. Baillie Cochrane called attention
to the Widows and Servants of Civil Servants, for whom the State
makes no provision by way of pension. Mr. Cochrane quoted
some hard cases of the kind, and there are hut too many in the Civil
Service as well as out of it. But the last sentence of the Chancellor
of the Exchequer’s answer contains the pith of the matter :—
“ The proper system to adopt is to pay our servants fairly and liberally for
the work they are called upon to do, and leave them to make their own pro-
visions for those they leave behind them.”
This, in or out of the House, comes home to common sense—so no
wonder Mr. Cochrane took nothing by his motion, much as kindly
feeling may have to say for it. Hard cases, it is said, make bad
law. They are just as likely to make bad laws, if too sympatheti-
cally listened to. The House must be hard of head, and, on occa-
sion, hard of hearing at the ear where Counsellor Kind-Heart is
whispering while Counsellor Common-Sense whispers to a very dif-
ferent purpose in the other.
Mr. Brassey has Punch's thanks for his speech on the Royal
Naval Reserve, and the expediency of doing something to strengthen
the ties between Merchant Service and Navy. He pointed out the
means by which more hoys might be trained for the Merchant Ser-
vice more of our fishermen attached to the Coast Defence Force, and
the Naval Reserves more efficiently stimulated and better looked after.
Mr. Brassey speaks sense on a very weighty. subject. The diffi-
culty is to get the true blue Navy officer to believe in the Merchant
sailor; to keep the Admiralty from, more or less, pooh-poohing
Loudon and Liverpool, Tyne and Thames, Clyde and Mersey, and
their rough-and-ready “ folks’le hands.”
Mr. Goshen denied the existence of any such feeling on the part
of the late Government, and Mr. Ward Hunt on the part of the
present. Punch rejoices to hear that we added 2000 to our Naval
Reserve in the course of last year, and that it now stands at 13,000.
But why is it not three times as large ?
Mr. M‘Gregor, for the Mercantile Marine, disclaimed any preju-
dice against the Naval Reserve.
Captain Price showed how the Reserve’s drill might he improved ;
Sir John Hay how its numbers and efficiency might he increased by