Punch (67.1874)

September 12, 1874.] PUNCH, OK THE LONDON CHARIVARI.

LAWN TENNIS.

Miss Maud. “ How do we stand ?”

Captain Lovelace. “They are Six to our Love; and ‘Love’ always

MEANS NOTHING, YOU KNOW.”

Miss Maud. “ Always ? ”

THE CITY MULBERRY TREES.

Degenerate Drapers! Is it a fact
That the utilitarian cataract
Your eyes has so served to harden,

That you really mean, for a paltry fee,

To disestablish the Mulberry Tree—

Grub up your lovely garden ?

A glimpse of green in the City’s heart!

A little haven of rest apart
From Mammon’s turmoil and trouble!

Pshaw ! L.S.D. is the faith we hold.

Build over the fount with its fish of gold,

So our rental of gold we double.

’Tis the God of the Age, this L.S.D.—

The utilitarian trinity—

Whereof we are all adorers:

And a City Company ’s hound by its creed
To stick right close to the friend in need,

And scorn sentimental soarers.

So the Mulberry Trees are all laid low,

And there’s an end to their golden glow—

The brighter that seemed for its rarity ;

And may we ask—or were’t better not ?—

When the garden is gone and the money is got,
Will it be spent in Charity ?

Or will it be spent, City-Company-wise,

In making each dinner a new emprise
For digestion’s taxed activity ?

What’s a fountain fair to a turtle tureen,

Or the greenest lawn to the fat that’s green
At a gorgeous Hall-festivity ?

For this indeed did our Fathers build ?

Was guttling and gorging of each old Guild
The end, if not the beginner ?

Did they dream those Mulberry Trees must stoop
To furnish a little more turtle-soup
At the Drapers’ magnificent dinner ?

Punch troweth not. In those ages old
They feasted well upon well-won gold,

And of charity were not chary :

They lived great lives, and helped their nei ghbours,
And this was the motto of their labours,

Laborare est orare.

A dinner is good, saith the Prophet Punch,

If not too greedily people munch:

But the diners and money-scrapers
Might feel that a spot of garden-soil,

In the very heart of the City of Toil,

Should have sacred been kept by the Drapers.

BRITISH AUTOMATON.

A Strange Case of Intermittent Unconsciousness.

Mr. Punch begs respectfully to submit the following “ case ”—
for the authenticity of which he is, in every particular, prepared to
vouch—to the consideration of Professor Huxley

Mr. John Smith Robinson (British paterfamilias) having some
years ago met with some marked success in business, has ever since
been, from time to time, subject to certain morbid hallucinations as
to the obligations of his social position. In his normal life he is
cheerful, sensible, and in every respect a rationally conducted man.
That normal life lasts about ten months of the year; but, for the
remaining two, usually the months of August and September, he !
passes into a totally abnormal existence. In this last state he is
still active, often painfully so; but, though he eats, drinks, and
goes about as usual, he enjoys nothing. His actions are purely
mechanical. For instance, on a Bradshaw being put into his hand
by his wife or daughters, he instantly conceives the idea of
“ travelling,” and carries it out accordingly, thereby showing that
in this condition the functions of the cerebral hemisphere are largely
annihilated, and that left to himself, without knowing what he is
about, he will illustrate the first law of locomotion. In this state
he is capable of performing all sorts of extraordinary actions on
mere suggestions. For example, on a hooked stick being thrust into
his hand, he will toil up either Snowdon or the Righi, at a cost of
comfort and enjoyment to himself which is almost appalling.

Again, on being told emphatically that “the girls want sea-
bathing,” he will take expensive apartments at Eastbourne or
Scarborough, allow himself to be dragged up and down the Parade, |

and generally hustled and stared at for six consecutive weeks.
Sometimes Mrs. John Smith Robinson will insist that “ he ought
to hire a place on the Moors,” and then the extraordinary phenome- ;
non of a middle-aged and not over-active man wandering about with
a gun, and taking very bad shots, may be seen any day in the
neighbourhood of his “ place ” for two or more months.

In his normal life usually contented and agreeable, he now
becomes sulky, irritable, and morose. Naturally truthful and up-
right in his business transactions, he will now stoop to falsehood
and deception, and talk of “urgent business necessitating his
presence in Town.” If driven on to a Channel boat, he will, for ;
many weeks, allow himself to wander among people whose language
he does not know, whose customs he loathes, whose comforts he seeks
in vain, and whose food refuses to agree with him.

Finally, at the expiration of his “ fit,” he is restored to his old
quarters and former routine, when he seems totally to forget the
irritations, disappointments, and fatigues of his two months’

“ abnormal existence.” To such a marvellous extent are the
impressions he has received effaced, that at precisely the same time
in the ensuing year he repeats the folly.

The case is an interesting one, but is regarded as incurable.

Plants and Animals.—Have we any native “carnivorous
plants ” ? Some appear to be denoted such by their names—dog-
rose, foxglove, sow-thistle, hawkweed, dandelion; and amongst
those which, though not indigenous, are cultivated in gardens,
there is the tiger-lily.

The Horn oe the Dilemma for Tyndall.—The Matter-horn.

Vol. 67.

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