DOI issue:
September 25, 1880
DOI Page / Citation link:https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.17764#0146
138
PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI.
[September 25, 1880.
A MISNOMER, SURELY!
Tourist. “ You have eather a large Party this afternoon, Sandro ! ”
Waiter. “Yes, Sare ! It is von of Mistaee Cook’s Parties. Dere are twenty-te.ee Patients in all !”
BUS IN URBE.
[A Meditation in Mud-Salad Market.)
The fat mud churned by many a heavy wain
Into putrescent hotch-potch slab and slimy, _
The pavements fouled by rotting leaves and rain,
The gutters choked, all greasy, grubby, grimy ;
Here frowsy bulks potato-stored, a-dust,
There tumble-down strange structures shored and hoarded,
A sodden slime doth all things here incrust;
A sad and sooty scene, unsavoury, sordid.
The clamorous carman yells upon his cart,
The foul-mouthed coster curses by the kerb, he
Uncurbed ; for this is London’s loveliest mart,
Its Hus in TJrbe !
Hence radiate muck-choked roadways far around,
Which strike the strange wayfarer with wild wonder
What midden huge, what central garbage-mound,
From fairer thoroughfares these sludge-ways sunder.
Ho cottage dust-heap, cumbered with stale waste
Of a year’s joskin-fodder, smells more rankly ;
Ho reeking swamp, whence nose-nipt travellers haste,
Seethes ’neath the sun more dirtily and dankly.
All sluggish vehicles that are, upchoke
These foul and fetid roadways, dusk and narrow,
Waggon, cart, truck, and, with sonorous “ moke,”
The coster’s barrow.
How foot unfouled, how thread unshouldered, clean,
These dolorous ways ? Here tumbles the tost hamper,
There Hies stale garden-stuff that once was green,
Mudgrubbers grope, and shoeless urchins scamper.
The hobnailed churl with elephantine hoof
Slops sullenly along, uncouth, uncaring,
Anri brazen girls slack-garmented, shame-proof,
Hustle and holloa, draggletailed and daring.
Piled cabbages and basket-barriers block
The devious ways, and sacks, and crates, and cases;
And frowzy crones with grey and touzled shocks,
And wrinkled faces.
Whence haply issuing—if luck so will—
Come we upon a low, uncomely cluster
Of roofs and avenues ; nor taste nor skill
Decks these arcades, whereunder closely muster
Vendors of—rags and refuse ? mud ? manure ?
Hot so ; of Hature’s choicest, cheeriest benisons;
Of luscious fruits, and flowers fair as pure,
Worthy of song from lyres as sweet as Tennyson’s.
And nought, save care in storage and display,
Heeds there to make this rookery, Covent Harden,
As a Duke’s pleasaunce trim, and green and gay
As any Arden.
Did Dux mean leader still, and not a slow
Reluctant follower of all improvement,
We might have all this altered at a blow
With some alert “ His Grace ” to lead the movement
Shall dull patricians and parochial dolts
Perpetuate the nuisance ? Punch protesteth.
While the Duke’s Dusthole every sense revolts,
And in the midst of Babylon muckdom nesteth,
He means to peg away, since, for his part,
Whatever vested interest it disturb, he
Holds Covent Garden might, in London’s heart,
Be Hus in Urbe !
Something in It.
From South Australia a correspondent sends us the following
anagram:—
“.William Ewart Gladstone.
At trees a man will go wild.”
PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI.
[September 25, 1880.
A MISNOMER, SURELY!
Tourist. “ You have eather a large Party this afternoon, Sandro ! ”
Waiter. “Yes, Sare ! It is von of Mistaee Cook’s Parties. Dere are twenty-te.ee Patients in all !”
BUS IN URBE.
[A Meditation in Mud-Salad Market.)
The fat mud churned by many a heavy wain
Into putrescent hotch-potch slab and slimy, _
The pavements fouled by rotting leaves and rain,
The gutters choked, all greasy, grubby, grimy ;
Here frowsy bulks potato-stored, a-dust,
There tumble-down strange structures shored and hoarded,
A sodden slime doth all things here incrust;
A sad and sooty scene, unsavoury, sordid.
The clamorous carman yells upon his cart,
The foul-mouthed coster curses by the kerb, he
Uncurbed ; for this is London’s loveliest mart,
Its Hus in TJrbe !
Hence radiate muck-choked roadways far around,
Which strike the strange wayfarer with wild wonder
What midden huge, what central garbage-mound,
From fairer thoroughfares these sludge-ways sunder.
Ho cottage dust-heap, cumbered with stale waste
Of a year’s joskin-fodder, smells more rankly ;
Ho reeking swamp, whence nose-nipt travellers haste,
Seethes ’neath the sun more dirtily and dankly.
All sluggish vehicles that are, upchoke
These foul and fetid roadways, dusk and narrow,
Waggon, cart, truck, and, with sonorous “ moke,”
The coster’s barrow.
How foot unfouled, how thread unshouldered, clean,
These dolorous ways ? Here tumbles the tost hamper,
There Hies stale garden-stuff that once was green,
Mudgrubbers grope, and shoeless urchins scamper.
The hobnailed churl with elephantine hoof
Slops sullenly along, uncouth, uncaring,
Anri brazen girls slack-garmented, shame-proof,
Hustle and holloa, draggletailed and daring.
Piled cabbages and basket-barriers block
The devious ways, and sacks, and crates, and cases;
And frowzy crones with grey and touzled shocks,
And wrinkled faces.
Whence haply issuing—if luck so will—
Come we upon a low, uncomely cluster
Of roofs and avenues ; nor taste nor skill
Decks these arcades, whereunder closely muster
Vendors of—rags and refuse ? mud ? manure ?
Hot so ; of Hature’s choicest, cheeriest benisons;
Of luscious fruits, and flowers fair as pure,
Worthy of song from lyres as sweet as Tennyson’s.
And nought, save care in storage and display,
Heeds there to make this rookery, Covent Harden,
As a Duke’s pleasaunce trim, and green and gay
As any Arden.
Did Dux mean leader still, and not a slow
Reluctant follower of all improvement,
We might have all this altered at a blow
With some alert “ His Grace ” to lead the movement
Shall dull patricians and parochial dolts
Perpetuate the nuisance ? Punch protesteth.
While the Duke’s Dusthole every sense revolts,
And in the midst of Babylon muckdom nesteth,
He means to peg away, since, for his part,
Whatever vested interest it disturb, he
Holds Covent Garden might, in London’s heart,
Be Hus in Urbe !
Something in It.
From South Australia a correspondent sends us the following
anagram:—
“.William Ewart Gladstone.
At trees a man will go wild.”