DOI Heft:
March 8, 1884
DOI Seite / Zitierlink: https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.17756#0115
PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI.
March 8, 1884.]
SOMETHING ON COMMISSION.
Further, dissatisfaction, having1 been expressed in certain influ-
ential quarters as to the constitution of the Royal Commission
recently appointed to inquire into the question of the Dwellings of
the Poor, several of the leading Members again met secretly yester-
day for the purpose, not only of disposing personally of the various
objections raised against their individual appointment, but also of
vindicating the claims of their body generally to merit public con-
fidence in the important undertaking they now have in hand.
The door having been locked by the unanimous consent of those
assembled, and Sir Charles Dilke immediately voted into the Chair,
he said he would not waste their time by any lengthy preamble, but
come to the point at once. On Friday last, smarting under the gibes
of a set of captious know-nothings in the Press—and elsewhere—
(“ Hear, hear ! ”)—who had hinted that the presence at that Board
of several of the Commissioners, owing to their want of practical
experience of the evils they were called on to investigate, would be
worse than useless [“Shame.'”), they had determined then and
there to adjourn their meeting for a week for the purpose of passing
the interval in “energetic personal inquiry.” ( Cheers.) This ordeal,
to judge from the worn and. dilapidated aspect of the Commissioners
he saw around him that morning—(roars of laughter)—there had
been evidently no disposition to shirk. (“ Hear, hear ! ”) All he
could do then was to remark that he was not only prepared but eager
to hear what they had got to say. (Cheers.)
Lord Salisbury, who had his head bandaged, and was evidently
suffering from intermittent toothache and sciatica, and whose
appearance on rising caused a considerable amo unt of merriment,
said he really had very little to tell the meeting. {A laugh.) He
did not see what there was to laugh at. (Renewed laughter.) Some
twopenny-halfpenny^ scribbler had asserted that he, as a British
Marquis, could possibly know nothing of real life in a Metropolitan
slum. He had determined to give a practical contradiction to that
statement. {Cheers.) He had disguised himself as an Irish labourer,
and rented the fifth of a room in a back court in Seven Dials for a
week. {Loud cheers.) He did not see what there was to cheer at.
(‘‘ Oh, oh!”) His experience had been practical enough. He had had
two stand-up fights, his head nearly broken with a brickbat, and he
had been taken three times into custody by blundering Constables—
who would not look at his card—and he had, as the result, got a
rheumatic attack, which Sir William Gull thought likely to be
chronic. (A Voice—“ Never mind that! ”) That was all very well;
but he had quite made up his mind about what the working classes
really wanted. (“ Hear, hear ! ”) They wanted better homes, better
incomes, better food, better clothes, better manners, more polite
Policemen—and most of all—better claret. Some Chateau Margaux
he had tried in Clare Market had nearly killed him. (Cheers.)
Cardinal Manning here rose. He said that he was unwilling to
contradict the Noble Marquis who had given them all such an
amusing and spirited account of his experiences; but he, the
Cardinal, must beg to differ with him. What the poor wanted was
some really palatable drinking water. {“Hear, hear!”) His
colleagues might scarcely credit it, but he had spent six consecutive
days in climbing in and out of, and tasting continually—he might
say, copiously—the water of cisterns in the lowest class of alleys in
and about Bermondsey, the Borough Road, Clerkenwell, the out-
lying districts of Kilburn, and the Isle of Dogs. ( Cheers.) He had
not felt well since. {Renerved cheers.) Now if that indisposition
was the result of the water, the Government ought at once to supply
te every pauper in this country a thirteen-and-sixpenny filter.
(“ Hear !”) A credit vote of five millions and a-half sterling would
] soon remedy that evil.
Mr. Jesse Collings said, with all respect for the Cardinal’s figures,
he thought it would be far better to contract with some enterprising
company to lay on a good supply of “ Apollinaris.” This would be
far cheaper, and much more refreshing, and if it were found lowering
to the system in depressing districts, it could be mixed freely with a
little whiskey that could be chargeable to the rates. No philanthropic
householder could object to such an outlay as this. {Cheers.) Such a
beverage would, at least, elevate the tone of the masses. (“ Hear!”)
Mr. Lyulph Stanley, who had a very dejected appearance, said,
though no friend to stimulants, he was not unprepared to support
the suggestion of the last speaker. He had made it his business to
try and enjoy himself in an innocent way, after the fashion of the
lower classes, during the course of an East-End Sunday. He had
done all that could be done in the way of recreation in the neighbour-
hood. {“Hear, hear !”) He had stood five hours outside a public-
house, and seven inside. Three hours he had looked at a gutter, and
the rest of the day he had passed in playing at pitch-and-toss with a
weighted halfpenny. {Sensation.) That is why he looked unhappy.
~fe thought the lower classes needed recreation, but whether in the
snape of Italian Opera, a State-aided Fancy Ball, permanent nightly
nreworks, or higher culture, in evening dress, with a magic lantern,
he was not prepared to say. (“ Hear ! ”)
At this point of the proceedings a letter arrived for the Chairman,
and, after perusing it once or twice, he rose, and said he thought, as
it contained an admirable practical suggestion from a very distin-
uished member of the Commission indeed—{cheers)—he could not
o better than read it to those assembled. {“Hear, hear!”) It was
as follows:—
My dear Sir Charles,
I had heard of your projected Meeting for to-day, and as,
though I regret I am personally unable to attend it, I am most
anxious to give the excellent object that brings you together my
hearty co-operation and support, I have much pleasure in placing
the subjoined suggestion at your disposal. Would it not be an excel-
lent tiling were some eight or nine of the Commissioners, who might
select themselves by lot, to hire an ill-ventilated room—say, ten feet
by seven—and undertake to sleep on the floor for a fortnight or so—•
it being understood, of course, that the cubic feet of air available for
the whole party would be something short of the mark ? I cannot
but think that some such experience on the part either of yourself or
your colleagues would prove at once a valuable, interesting, and
amusing assistance to the progress of our joint labours. Offering
you this suggestion for what it is worth, I am, my dear Sir Charles,
Yours sincerely,
A Brother Commissioner.
After the reading of the above letter, which was interrupted
throughout by loud and prolonged bursts of cheering, the Chairman,
intimating that his influenza, caught during his recent three days’
apprenticeship to a match-box maker resident in a cellar at Hounds-
ditch, was again beginning to be troublesome, declared the .Meeting
adjourned, and the company quietly separated.
BURLESQUE AND MELODRAMA.
Piece in one Act, written for a “ Star ” anxious to shine in various lights.
Scene—A gorgeous Interior. Large curtain {practicable) at back.
Star presiding at a Cabinet Council. Period doubtful. Costumes
splendid.
Star. And this is your work !
[Makes a long declamatory speech a la Ruy Blas, showing how
the Ministry has brought the country to the verge of ruin.
A Courtier. Ah, my Lord, you are severe. You are a patriot.
Would that we were patriots. But as for us, we have been frivolous
from our birth up! [Exeunt everybody save the Star.
Star. And they think that. I have never been frivolous ! Why,
in the day of my hot youth I was the gayest of the gay ! I spent
the whole of my time singing and dancing. Yes—singing and
dancing. {Looking round.) There is no one present. Let me
indulge in mimicries of my hot youth. There!
[Sings and dances. At the end of the entertainment enter
Charles {his friend) in a disguise cloak.
Charles {his friend). At last we meet face to face !
Star. Welcome—thrice welcome ! How well I remember the way
we spent our time as boys together.
[Long speech introduced, full of comedy, showing the way the two
spent their time as boys together.
Charles {his friend) {after the Star has taken his encore). You are
mistaken. I am Charles {throwing off disguise)—but no longer
your friend ! {Producing stvords.) Choose your weapon!
Star. What, the Duck der Richerloo ! At last!
[Seizes sword. Magnificent duel a la the Corsican Brothers.
Charles {his friend) is wounded to the death.
Charles {his friend). Ah! But, ere I die, let me curse you. I-
[Dies.
Star. Poor fellow ! He would have cursed me ! He would have
said-- [Delivers the curse for him.
After the applause has subsided, the body of Charles is removed.
Mourners. Your blessing, my Lord ! [They fall on their knees.
Star. You ask my blessing ? Well, be it as you will. (Delivers
blessing in sixty lines of polished blank verse. Exeunt Mourners.)
Nay, but this has fatigued me ! I must seek repose. This is no act-
ing, but terrible earnest. How different from the past; how well I
remember the days when, at the Court of Yaresile, I used to please
the Court of the Regent of France, with my amateur acting. (Falls
asleep upon a couch, covered with curtains, a la Matthias in the
“Bells.” The Curtain at the back of the Stage is withdrawn, show-
ing the Star’s dream, in which he imagines that he is giving selections
from “Hamlet,” “Othello,” and “Macbeth.” When his imper-
sonations are exhausted, the Curtain falls, and the Star wakes up.)
Ah, those were happy days! {Rising from his couch.) But what is
this ? An earthquake! {Earthquake. General destruction oj
Interior.) And I alone am saved! {Is struck by lightning.) Not
so! Oh! [Dies in five-and-forty minutes, according to taste.
Curtain.
March 8, 1884.]
SOMETHING ON COMMISSION.
Further, dissatisfaction, having1 been expressed in certain influ-
ential quarters as to the constitution of the Royal Commission
recently appointed to inquire into the question of the Dwellings of
the Poor, several of the leading Members again met secretly yester-
day for the purpose, not only of disposing personally of the various
objections raised against their individual appointment, but also of
vindicating the claims of their body generally to merit public con-
fidence in the important undertaking they now have in hand.
The door having been locked by the unanimous consent of those
assembled, and Sir Charles Dilke immediately voted into the Chair,
he said he would not waste their time by any lengthy preamble, but
come to the point at once. On Friday last, smarting under the gibes
of a set of captious know-nothings in the Press—and elsewhere—
(“ Hear, hear ! ”)—who had hinted that the presence at that Board
of several of the Commissioners, owing to their want of practical
experience of the evils they were called on to investigate, would be
worse than useless [“Shame.'”), they had determined then and
there to adjourn their meeting for a week for the purpose of passing
the interval in “energetic personal inquiry.” ( Cheers.) This ordeal,
to judge from the worn and. dilapidated aspect of the Commissioners
he saw around him that morning—(roars of laughter)—there had
been evidently no disposition to shirk. (“ Hear, hear ! ”) All he
could do then was to remark that he was not only prepared but eager
to hear what they had got to say. (Cheers.)
Lord Salisbury, who had his head bandaged, and was evidently
suffering from intermittent toothache and sciatica, and whose
appearance on rising caused a considerable amo unt of merriment,
said he really had very little to tell the meeting. {A laugh.) He
did not see what there was to laugh at. (Renewed laughter.) Some
twopenny-halfpenny^ scribbler had asserted that he, as a British
Marquis, could possibly know nothing of real life in a Metropolitan
slum. He had determined to give a practical contradiction to that
statement. {Cheers.) He had disguised himself as an Irish labourer,
and rented the fifth of a room in a back court in Seven Dials for a
week. {Loud cheers.) He did not see what there was to cheer at.
(‘‘ Oh, oh!”) His experience had been practical enough. He had had
two stand-up fights, his head nearly broken with a brickbat, and he
had been taken three times into custody by blundering Constables—
who would not look at his card—and he had, as the result, got a
rheumatic attack, which Sir William Gull thought likely to be
chronic. (A Voice—“ Never mind that! ”) That was all very well;
but he had quite made up his mind about what the working classes
really wanted. (“ Hear, hear ! ”) They wanted better homes, better
incomes, better food, better clothes, better manners, more polite
Policemen—and most of all—better claret. Some Chateau Margaux
he had tried in Clare Market had nearly killed him. (Cheers.)
Cardinal Manning here rose. He said that he was unwilling to
contradict the Noble Marquis who had given them all such an
amusing and spirited account of his experiences; but he, the
Cardinal, must beg to differ with him. What the poor wanted was
some really palatable drinking water. {“Hear, hear!”) His
colleagues might scarcely credit it, but he had spent six consecutive
days in climbing in and out of, and tasting continually—he might
say, copiously—the water of cisterns in the lowest class of alleys in
and about Bermondsey, the Borough Road, Clerkenwell, the out-
lying districts of Kilburn, and the Isle of Dogs. ( Cheers.) He had
not felt well since. {Renerved cheers.) Now if that indisposition
was the result of the water, the Government ought at once to supply
te every pauper in this country a thirteen-and-sixpenny filter.
(“ Hear !”) A credit vote of five millions and a-half sterling would
] soon remedy that evil.
Mr. Jesse Collings said, with all respect for the Cardinal’s figures,
he thought it would be far better to contract with some enterprising
company to lay on a good supply of “ Apollinaris.” This would be
far cheaper, and much more refreshing, and if it were found lowering
to the system in depressing districts, it could be mixed freely with a
little whiskey that could be chargeable to the rates. No philanthropic
householder could object to such an outlay as this. {Cheers.) Such a
beverage would, at least, elevate the tone of the masses. (“ Hear!”)
Mr. Lyulph Stanley, who had a very dejected appearance, said,
though no friend to stimulants, he was not unprepared to support
the suggestion of the last speaker. He had made it his business to
try and enjoy himself in an innocent way, after the fashion of the
lower classes, during the course of an East-End Sunday. He had
done all that could be done in the way of recreation in the neighbour-
hood. {“Hear, hear !”) He had stood five hours outside a public-
house, and seven inside. Three hours he had looked at a gutter, and
the rest of the day he had passed in playing at pitch-and-toss with a
weighted halfpenny. {Sensation.) That is why he looked unhappy.
~fe thought the lower classes needed recreation, but whether in the
snape of Italian Opera, a State-aided Fancy Ball, permanent nightly
nreworks, or higher culture, in evening dress, with a magic lantern,
he was not prepared to say. (“ Hear ! ”)
At this point of the proceedings a letter arrived for the Chairman,
and, after perusing it once or twice, he rose, and said he thought, as
it contained an admirable practical suggestion from a very distin-
uished member of the Commission indeed—{cheers)—he could not
o better than read it to those assembled. {“Hear, hear!”) It was
as follows:—
My dear Sir Charles,
I had heard of your projected Meeting for to-day, and as,
though I regret I am personally unable to attend it, I am most
anxious to give the excellent object that brings you together my
hearty co-operation and support, I have much pleasure in placing
the subjoined suggestion at your disposal. Would it not be an excel-
lent tiling were some eight or nine of the Commissioners, who might
select themselves by lot, to hire an ill-ventilated room—say, ten feet
by seven—and undertake to sleep on the floor for a fortnight or so—•
it being understood, of course, that the cubic feet of air available for
the whole party would be something short of the mark ? I cannot
but think that some such experience on the part either of yourself or
your colleagues would prove at once a valuable, interesting, and
amusing assistance to the progress of our joint labours. Offering
you this suggestion for what it is worth, I am, my dear Sir Charles,
Yours sincerely,
A Brother Commissioner.
After the reading of the above letter, which was interrupted
throughout by loud and prolonged bursts of cheering, the Chairman,
intimating that his influenza, caught during his recent three days’
apprenticeship to a match-box maker resident in a cellar at Hounds-
ditch, was again beginning to be troublesome, declared the .Meeting
adjourned, and the company quietly separated.
BURLESQUE AND MELODRAMA.
Piece in one Act, written for a “ Star ” anxious to shine in various lights.
Scene—A gorgeous Interior. Large curtain {practicable) at back.
Star presiding at a Cabinet Council. Period doubtful. Costumes
splendid.
Star. And this is your work !
[Makes a long declamatory speech a la Ruy Blas, showing how
the Ministry has brought the country to the verge of ruin.
A Courtier. Ah, my Lord, you are severe. You are a patriot.
Would that we were patriots. But as for us, we have been frivolous
from our birth up! [Exeunt everybody save the Star.
Star. And they think that. I have never been frivolous ! Why,
in the day of my hot youth I was the gayest of the gay ! I spent
the whole of my time singing and dancing. Yes—singing and
dancing. {Looking round.) There is no one present. Let me
indulge in mimicries of my hot youth. There!
[Sings and dances. At the end of the entertainment enter
Charles {his friend) in a disguise cloak.
Charles {his friend). At last we meet face to face !
Star. Welcome—thrice welcome ! How well I remember the way
we spent our time as boys together.
[Long speech introduced, full of comedy, showing the way the two
spent their time as boys together.
Charles {his friend) {after the Star has taken his encore). You are
mistaken. I am Charles {throwing off disguise)—but no longer
your friend ! {Producing stvords.) Choose your weapon!
Star. What, the Duck der Richerloo ! At last!
[Seizes sword. Magnificent duel a la the Corsican Brothers.
Charles {his friend) is wounded to the death.
Charles {his friend). Ah! But, ere I die, let me curse you. I-
[Dies.
Star. Poor fellow ! He would have cursed me ! He would have
said-- [Delivers the curse for him.
After the applause has subsided, the body of Charles is removed.
Mourners. Your blessing, my Lord ! [They fall on their knees.
Star. You ask my blessing ? Well, be it as you will. (Delivers
blessing in sixty lines of polished blank verse. Exeunt Mourners.)
Nay, but this has fatigued me ! I must seek repose. This is no act-
ing, but terrible earnest. How different from the past; how well I
remember the days when, at the Court of Yaresile, I used to please
the Court of the Regent of France, with my amateur acting. (Falls
asleep upon a couch, covered with curtains, a la Matthias in the
“Bells.” The Curtain at the back of the Stage is withdrawn, show-
ing the Star’s dream, in which he imagines that he is giving selections
from “Hamlet,” “Othello,” and “Macbeth.” When his imper-
sonations are exhausted, the Curtain falls, and the Star wakes up.)
Ah, those were happy days! {Rising from his couch.) But what is
this ? An earthquake! {Earthquake. General destruction oj
Interior.) And I alone am saved! {Is struck by lightning.) Not
so! Oh! [Dies in five-and-forty minutes, according to taste.
Curtain.