Punch (77.1879)

250

PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI.

[November 29, L879.

FOR THE WOMEN.

Me. Punch,—Having1 become the fortunate possessor of half-a-dozen Bank
Shares by the will of a well-disposed relative, I have no right to grumble that
in my old age I am forced to travel third-class by rail, and to ride in tram-cars.
I make no complaint of this. The differences between classes—on and off the
rail—are only skin-deep. Still, there are some of them that want lessening—
and I think you and your artists could lessen them—however you like to spell
the word.

It is little matter if I, with my shaky legs and uninteresting white hair, have

to stand in an over-crowded railway-carriage, while well-
dressed young members of the "'Aimr-stocracy" are
comfortably seated. Male Man, old or young, must take
his chance, and has no right to plead manners on his own
behalf.

Nor is it everyone who is of Chaeles Lamb's opinion
about "the sacredness of female eld." But most of
our sex, it is thought, are ready to recognise the claims
of young womanhood, particularly with good looks to
back them. Let me correct this impresssion, by exactly
describing what I saw on the North London Line the
other day. The seats were all filled in our carriage,
when a modestly-mannered and modestly-dressed girl
got in, exactly like the pretty young creatures John
Leech used to draw for us in the olden—I mean my
younger—time. Three young fellows occupied the seats
on either side the door against which she stood. One was
puffing a cheap cigar, another reading a red-and-yellow
railway novel, the third pretending to sleep, with his
hands resting on the head of his flashy cane. Not one
stirred all through the ride !

Again and again I have seen pretty and delicate-
lookmg girls, though of no higher rank, T am bound to
add, than shop-attendants, or milliners' workwomen in
all probability, on their way to their daily work, treated
in the same un-cavalier fashion by well-dressed men.
In fact, " every man for himself" seems to be the rule
on the East End lines. The offer of a seat to a crowded-
out woman, young or old, is the exception.

It is said that Mrs. Teollope's telling pen-and-ink
caricatures cured the Americans of throwing their^ legs
on tables and over chair-backs. I can't help thinking a
few of Mr. Punch's pen-and-pencil pictures might work
an improvement, if not a cure, of the unmanly state of
things I have described. I believe half of it arises from
shyness; but it seems fast hardening into custom, and
the sooner the indurating process can be stopped the
better—or so it seems to

Your constant reader and subscriber,

Jonathan Oldbttck.

Give and Take.

{To my Lord B., on his " Imperium et Libertas.'''')

Feab for Liberties we have
If your Imperium waken,

All question we may waive
Of the Liberties vou've taken !

MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING.

{An Ecstatic ^Esthetic & la Mode.)

" I sits with my feet in a brook,

And if any one axes me why,
I gives 'em a tap with my crook—

' 'lis sentiment makes me,' says I."

Hee softly sculptured lips, sharply indrawn,
As with some subtle shiver half supprest,

Blanch to the snowiness of bleached lawn.
The trim and taper finger-tips that rest,

Soft as new-fallen snow-flakes, on her crook,
Are tinted with a tender turquoise blue ;

Her feet flush red, as, plunged in a chill brook,
Fair feet are apt to do.

The morhidezza of her marble cheek,
Speaks it of dying life or living death ?

One seems to see—so doth the canvas speak—
The swift soft sibilation of her breath.

So sits she, shadowing mysteries manifold,
In incomplete expectancy of—what ?

Perhaps 'tis of an influenza cold,
Perhaps, again, 'tis not!

"What precious pregnancy of pulsing life !

"What vast potentialities of passion !
What strange reluctance with desire at strife !

The robe's white tissue, cut in clinging fashion,
Against her coy oarnations, warmly wan,

Shines like to tarnished silver's chastened sheen,
Her flesh-tints pure are joy to gaze upon,
Purple, and grey, and green!

Languor supprest, quivering intensity,

And unripe insufficiency of self,
Speak in each eyelid broad, and caverned eye,

And ridged clavicle's projecting shelf.
Deep sympathies of crescent womanhood,

Keen urgency of unperfected love,
Dull aching thrills, as of half-frozen blood,
That may not freely move,

Such aches as chaste desires—and chilblains—give.

Oh! quite too perfect quiteness of sick sweetness,
What subtly sensuous symphonisms live

In thy soft sumptuousness of calm completeness!
In which—ah! curse of Momus and his mockings !—

Nought sees the ribald, rash, Philistine fool.
Save a sham-shepherdess sans shoes and stockings,
Foot-paddling in a pool!

As Good as a Pantomime.

We learn from the Roman Correspondent of the Daily News
that:—■

" Signor Cairoli and Signor Depretis have been busied in the forma-
tion of a Cabinet, to take up the work of the Government pretty much where
it was broken off'in July."

When to this is added that—

"-the President of the Budget Commission may be brought in to answer

the expected criticism of Signor G-rimaldi,"

—no wonder if we anticipate that the criticism of Signor Gbimaldi
will be " Here we are again ! "

The "Distinctive Badge" {to be ivorn by Newspaper Corre-
spondents accompanying Armies in the Field).—A gag.