Punch: Punch (75.1878)

6 LUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI. [Jm* 13, 1878.

PUT TO THE ROUT.

Distracted Bandster. " Komm avay—komm avay—ee zhall nod give you nodingsh—ee yill blay de Moozeek ekselbst ! Teufel ! "

[They retreat hastily.

THE SCHOOLMASTER ABROAD.

Scene.—A Great Statesman's Snuggery.
Intehloctjtoes.—Bizzy and Dizzy.

Bizzy (bloiving a cloud). Yery pleasant sitting !

Dizzy. Extremely so! Gortschakoff, though, didn't quite seem
to relish my complimenting- him on his apparently robust health.

Bizzy. Looked more bilious than gouty, eh ? Well, it would be
hard if a valetudinarian might not play " le Malade Imaginaire " for
the benefit of his country—

Dizzy {drily). Or even to cut short dangerous discussion, or keep
down rising temper, eh ?

Bizzy. Well, I really feel very seedy, you know.

Dizzy. Awfully sorry, I'm sure. Now your Berlin air seems to
agree with me. Never felt better in my life.

Bizzy. Happy to hear it. Hope your health may not receive
cheek or chill when you get back to London. I hear the temperature
there has changed considerably since you left.

Dizzy. Oh, ours is a variable climate, but I'm used to it. Long
experience of mutability teaches one adroitness of adjustment.

Bizzy. Doubtless. Change of—ahem!—costume may sometimes
be as essential to the hero as to the histrio.

Dizzy. Aye! as needful as occasional change of air. Even con-
stitutions of blood and iron may sometimes welcome, for many
reasons, the transition from Berlin to--shall we say, Kissingen ?

Bizzy. My post is, at all events, a trying one to an enfeebled con-
stitution like mine ; and this supplementary Congress business has,
I confess, a little bit knocked me up—not possessing your own
splendid powers of recuperation, you know.

Dizzy. You scarcely do yourself justice, Prince. I must compli-
ment you upon being a ''judicious bottle-holder," as well as an
"honest broker." You keep the Ring splendidly; and your cry of
" Time! " is ever pat to the moment.

Bizzy. I do not know much about your Prize-Bing; but is not
the comparison a little mal a propos f Duty calls me to this post,
in the interests of Peace, but I should not be inclined to fag myself
out for the furtherance of War.

Dizzy. Precisely. You keep us in order capitally.
Bizzy. Oh! I make no pretensions.

Dizzy. Of course not. Fulminations are out of fashion in the
political Olympus. Where the ancient Jupiter would have flourished
his thunderbolts, the modern Jove fingers his watch and consults his
time-table.

Bizzy (aside.) Yery fair — for a phraseur. If smart speech
and sound statesmanship were synonymous! {Aloud.) Well, I
suppose the worst of it's over. The small fry, I hope, will take
their scraps thankfully, and their snubs meekly—for the time being,
at any rate. But, entre nous, I don't think your friend, the Turk,
quite likes it.

Dizzy {thoughtfully). Ah! that's another party that will have
to be educated. Well, I have dealt with pupils as intractable at
home.

Bizzy. By the way, your own more extreme worshippers may
require a little tactful tuition, eh ?

Dizzy. Oh, the Jingoes ? Doubtless! I hear they 're rather on the
rampage at present, some of them. Like speedy non-stayers, good
only for forcing the pace, they must "come back" to the leaders
when it' s a case of real racing. Nothing like the '' Dissolving Yiew''
system to deal with these people. The " Glorious Triumph" slide
will gradually merge into the * Satisfactory Settlement" one, you'll
see; only a few Jingoes will detect the difference, and they will feel
bound to swear there is none.

Bizzy (suggestively). Gladstone ?

Dizzy. A voice crying in the wilderness. Let him shout. The
walls of the Tory Jericho will not fall to the trumpet and lamp of that
political Joshua.

Bizzy. The " status quo ante helium," and " territorial integrity.

Dizzy. Watchwords of the past that have served their turn.
Public opinion deals with results, and is impatient of retrospective
criticism. Ask the Times.

Bizzy. Humph! The Times has asked me—several things. I
hope it has been satisfied with the frankness of my answers.

Dizzy. Who could object to your frankness, Prince? It is so
refreshing after a surfeit of transparent finesse and transpontine
dissimulation. Capital cigars these.