Punch (70.1876)

January 29, 1876.] PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI. 23

tastes far different from those he is usually credited with. He holds
a Spelling Bee every morning in his quiet little home in Thistle
Grove, which the Members of the Press are earnestly entreated to
join. After lunch, which consists usually of a cold crumpet and a glass
of liquid magnesia, he repairs to the Young Man's Improvement
Society's Rooms in Sloane Street, and gives a lecture, which he
often prefaces with an extract from one of Blair's Sermons. The
Series of Lectures now being delivered is on the '' Frivolity of
Giving Way to Laughter." Mr. Sothern rises at five every
morning, and cooks his own simple meal of oatmeal porridge and
plovers' eggs.

Mr. Toole, whose very name convulses a London audience, in the
privacy of his everyday life is of very ascetic habits. He retires to
bed as soon as he leaves the Gaiety (a name he would willingly
change if he could), in order that he may rise with the lark, to
pursue his favourite occupation of fetching watercress from the
suburban streams to fill the baskets of a grateful tribe of coster-
mongers. In the afternoon he presides at the Cabmen's Mutual Aid
Society, under the name of Mr. Lawrence, and is remarkable for
his reserved and austere manner. It is an extraordinary fact that
Mr. Toole is widely known under another name as a great artist,
being probably the only representative of the classical painters left
in England. TJp to the present time, his canvases have been of a
size to keep them out of the Royal Academy. He is now engaged
on a picture thirty-two feet by eighteen : subject, " The finding of
what is left of the body of Harold," which will, doubtless, be the
hit of the next exhibition in Burlington House. On Sundays,
Mr. Toole is a constant attendant at the Tabernacle, and allows
himself one glass of Ipecacuanha wine at dinner.

BEEF.

swear by
Roast Beef;
but the En-
glishman's
food

Is bounded
by Cookery
simple and
rude.

Too much
of a good
thing is
not always
good—
Though it be
the Roast
Beef of Old
England ;
Ay, e'en the
Old English
B,oast Beef.

And now beef has
grown so enor-
mously dear
That none but the
rich, every day
of the year
Can afford, if they
choose, such ex-
pensive good
cheer

As, 0 the Roast Beef of Old England,
And 0 the Old English Roast Beef !

There 's need for the working and family man
To have his food made go as far as it can,
And 'twere far from the most economical plan

To buy the Roast Beef of Old England,

The costly Old English Roast Beef.

Then train up young women in Cookery Schools,
That people may follow Frugality's rules,
And save money spent by improvident fools,

Who gorge the Roast Beef of Old England,

The very Old English Roast Beef.

The School-Board of London, in that happy thought,
Resolved girls should learn what of all things they ought,
The lore of the Kitchen are having them taught,

To cook the Roast Beef of Old England,

Nor only Old English Roast Beef.

And Bristol succeeds in the Capital's wake,
And BuckjMASxer teaches her children to make
All manner of dishes whereof to partake,

Besides the Roast Beef of Old England,
The changeless Old English Roast Beef.

Their minds stored not only with learning of books,
AVhilst taught to be scholars they learn to be cooks,
For the wise, an attraction exceeding good looks.

We love the Roast Beef of Old England,
Yet don't always like English Roast Beef.

0 keep not to national children confined
The culture most meet for the feminine mind,
As though your fine Ladies were only designed,
To eat the Roast Beef of Old England,
And much more than the English Roast Beef.

Nor in Board Schools alone cause young girls to pursue

The study to females especially due,

Teach Boarding-School girls how to fry, boil, and stew,
Jtoid mince the Roast Beef of Old England,
And so vary cold English Roast Beef.

THE SNOB'S PROGRESS.

Mr. Punch now-a-days has rarely reason to complain of the treat-
ment he receives at the hands of his contemporaries. Years ago his
articles used to be pirated in the most unceremonious manner, but
since the century has entered into its second half the magic name of
Punch has usually been attached to the good things extracted and
reprinted from his immortal columns. This being the case, it is a
little annoying to find a highly respectable newspaper publishing a
letter which was .evidently intended for the London Charivari.
" Siste Viator " writes as follows :—

" An ordinary train is timed to leave the Great "Western Station, Oxford, at
4-35 p.m. for the branch line to Witney and Fairford—worked by the Great
Western Bailway Company with their accustomed punctuality and regard for
the convenience of their passengers. (N.B.—This is fair testimony, and not
' wrote sarkasticle.') On Saturday, the loth inst., this train was unusually
full. The time for starting arrived, but there was no departure. After a ten
minutes' pause, passengers began to be restive, and inquiry to be made and

a little pressure elicited the fact that we were ' waiting for the Hon. Ma.-,

who had telegraphed to the Station Master to keep the train for him.' It
further appeared that the ' honourable' traveller expected to arrive at the
London and North-Western Station at Oxford five minutes after the Great
Western train by which he desired to travel should have left that station;
and, as the two stations are some five minutes' walk apart, a compliance with
this request must involve a delay of about ten minutes, and did in fact detain
the train for twenty minutes precisely. While this information was being
obtained, the Great Western Station Master prudently remained in ambush,
leaving his subordinates to encounter angry reproaches. But it seemed to be
clearly understood that this twenty minutes' detention occurred to oblige a
single mtendiug passenger, and not by the authority of the Superintendent of
the line."

Is not this delicious ? And yet this excellent story appears in
these columns at second hand. The selfish impertinence of '' the
Hon. Mr.-," and the cringing servility of "the official in am-
bush," are equally ludicrous. It is strange so capital an anecdote
should appear in a paper usually devoted to pure serious matter.
Mr. Punch knows that the story can not be true, because time and
trains, like to-day, wait for no man. And yet the tale is related
with a curious affectation of veracity. What shall Mr. Punch say ?
Why, this : that if the story is true, it really is his duty to call the
attention of the Great Western Directors to the conduct of their pro-
vincial Station Master, and to declare the selfish ill-bred, "low-
form" traveller to be none other than that anything but mythical
personage "the Hon. Mr. Snob."

Brutes In and Out of Boots.

" Police Constable, 22 0, said that, while on duty on Monday night in
Crown Street, he saw the prisoner knock a woman down, kick her, and jump
on her body. It was elicited by the Magistrate that the prisoner had no hoots
on; and the Magistrate said, ' had the prisoner worn boots- at the time, he
would have sent him to prison for three months, instead of, as he did,- for
two months.' "—The Times, Wednesday, Jan. 19, 1876.

So, now the rough knows the tariff. To jumping on a woman,
with boots on, three months. To jumping on a woman without
boots, two months. No'doubt, by a parity of reasoning, the amuse-
ment might be indulged in in slippers for a month; and in bare feet
for a week!

Geese that will never Save their Capital.—Turkish Bond-
holders.