Punch: Punch (75.1878)

September 7, 1878.] PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI. 107

HASTY GENERALISATION.

Mamma,. "We'd better go in, Darling! it threatens to Rain."
Harry. "Oh! then it won't!"
Mamma. "Why?"

Harry. "Papa always threatens to Vip me! but he never does

OUR REPRESENTATIVE MAN.

(In Toicn—Out of the Season.)

If the new Electric Light gains the day, or, rather, the night, against Gas, the
Poet Laureate_ will be engaged to celebrate its victory in an entirely new metre—his
present one being no longer of any use to him.

By the way, does Mr. John Hollingshead, eminently well up in his Dickens, re-
member what was the mad old gentleman's address to Miss La Creevy, on the occasion
of _ his sudden appearance down the chimney into Mrs. Nickleby's parlour ? " Aha! "
cried the old gentleman, folding his hands, and squeezing them with great force
against each other, "I see her now ; I see her now! My love, my life, my bride, my
peerless beauty! She is come at last—at last—and all is gas and gaiters!" For
"gas" read "electric light," and substitute " Gaiety" for fi gaiters,'' and then you
have the present state of the light question in the Strand just now.

I looked in at Evans's the other night. Ah, how the tempora mutantur, and, is
it possible that tios mutamur in illis f No, not on this subject. Evans's was unique.
Remembering the celebrated " Hardy Norseman " since I was a youth about town, I
murmured to myself, as I walked away—

The Hardy Norseman's house of yore "

Was, as we know, a glee :
It could be sung by twelve or more,

But not alone by me.
Oh, ne'er shall I forget the choir

That once there used to be,
Of course I mean when Paddy Green

Ruled o'er the harmonee.

I never paid a shilling then

To enter,—it was free ;
The company were only men,

Who stayed till nearly three.
" Dear Boys," alas ! are here no more,

Dear Girls now come to sup;
The Hardy Norseman's House before

The hour of one's shut up.

It would be as well if ingenious young dramatic
critics fresh to their work, and burning with the
ardent desire of slaughter, were to restrain their
ardour awhile for the purpose of obtaining some
correct information on the subject they've un-
dertaken to criticise. For example, the dramatic
critic of the Daily News, in reviewing Jeames
at the Gaiety; says, in an airy manner, " With
the incidents in the ' Yellowplush Papers' proba
bly no one is unacquainted"—except, as will be
seen, the critic himself—" but it would be difficult
to recognise them in the exaggerated version
here presented." The recognition would be more
than difficult—it would be impossible—Jeames
having no more to do with the '' Yellowplush
Papers" than with Vanity Fair, Pendennis, or
The Virginians. The play of Jeames is
from The Diary of Jeames de la Pluche, which
first 1 appeared in Punch, with Thackeray's own
grotesque illustrations. The Diary is included
under the head of Thackeray's Burlesques,"
while the Memoirs of Mr. C. J. Yellowplush-
there are no "Yellowplush Papers," although
the Daily Neivs critic quotes the title in inverted
commas—are bound up with the Paris Sketch
Book ; and, except that they are supposed to have
been written by an uneducated footman, they have
nothing in common with Jeames's Diary. The
story told by Mr. Yellowplush concerns the Hon
Mr. Deuceace, Lord Crabs, Lady Griffin, and her
poor crooked daughter. Jeames''s Diary is mainly
caricature, but there is a good honest purpose
throughout it, and in the characters of Mary
Anne, Granny, and Uncle Bill, Thackeray has
given us that touch of nature which enlists our
best and truest sympathies. But in the 3Ie?noirs
of Mr. C. J. Yelloicplush, all, except the dupes,
are villanously bad. There is not a redeeming
quality among the whole dramatis persona;, who
are, I venture to say, impossible on the Stage.
Their reality would be too hideous. Yet it was
with this work of Thackeray's, and not with
Jeames's Diary—from which Jeames was pro-
fessedly taken—that the observant and well-in-
formed critic compared the story of Jeames at the
Gaiety. His Editor will, I hope, reward his young
man's ingenuity with a well-bound copy of all
Thackeray's works, and, at the end of the half-
year, make him pass an examination in Jeames's
Diary and The Memoirs of Mr. C. J. Yellow-
plush. _

The Khedive has given up his revenues. Mr.
Rivers Wilson has been "spoiling the Egyp-
tians" to some purpose—I beg his pardon, I should
have said "improving the Egyptians," as they've
been going up wonderfully within the last fort-
night. Montez toujours ! as Lord Beaconsfield
says of Mr. Corry.

Mr. Knox, of Marlborough Street, retires.
Everyone in the Police Court is sorry. On the de-
parture of Knox, there will be mo(u)rning in
Marlborough Street.

boroughs and book-makers.
New work, by the Author of On Horseback
Through Asia 'Minor. Over the Birmingham
Caucus-es, on a Popular Cry.