Punch (95.1888)

THE REAL MUSIC OF THE FUTURE.

SlGNOK FOGHORNI, THE GREAT HIBERNIAN BASSO-TEN0RE ROBTJSTO-PROFONDO, IS SO DISGUSTED AT THE FBIVOLITY OF CON-
TEMPORARY MUSICAL TASTE (WHICH IS NOT RIPE ENOUGH TO APPRECIATE HIM), THAT HE GIVES UP ALL ATTEMPTS TO PLEASE THE
PRESENT GENERATION : HE BUYS A PHONOGRAPH INSTEAD, AND DEVOTES HIS ENERGIES TO SlXOIXO FOR POSTERITY. BY APPLYING
HIS EAR TO THIS MARVELLOUS INSTRUMENT IMMEDIATELY AFTER SINGING INTO IT, HE NOT ONLY HEARS HIS SONG ECHOED BACK TO
HIM OUT OF THE DIM FUTURE, BUT HE ALSO HEARS THE RAPTUROUS APPLAUSE OF UNBORN MILLIONS !

[ IVith Mr. Punch's compliments and apologies to Mr. Edison and Colonel Gouraud.

" FREE LANCES !"

[General Boulanger has sent a letter to M.
Deroulede, thanking the members of the League
of Patriots for their sentiments of devotion to the
cause of the National Party, which they know to
be that of patriotic, honest, and sincerely Eepublican
Prance.—Times.']

First Free Lance (Boulanger).

" My good blade carves the casques of men,

My tough lance thrusteth sure,
My strength is as the strength of ten,

Because my heart is pure.
Ahem ! No Tennysonian knight

Am I; yet 'twere not bad,
With matters in their present plight,

To pose as Galahad.

Second Free Lance [Grandolph).
Faith, how the swaggering Frenchman
flaunts

His " stainless banner! " Bosh!
He '11 find, for all his valorous vaunts,

That little game won't wash.
Fancy they hint the same of me,

The dolts whose shields I strike;
But anyhow my lance is free

To couch 'gainst whom I like.

First Free Lance.
Pst! Caracole, my coal-black steed!

The populace love prance,
To nodding plumes they give good heed;

At least 'tis so in France.

A Gallic Galahad.'_ Yonder youth

Is of another strain.
Much less like Lancelot, in sooth,

Than Gareth or Gawaine.

Second Free Lance.
" How sweet are looks that ladies bend

On whom their favours fall!
For them I battle to the end

To save from shame and thrall."
Ah, limpid Laureate, Primrose Dames

Rain favours upon me;
But as to championing their claims

2 outrance.'—we shall see !

First Free Lance.
" "When on my goodly charger borne

Through cheering towns I go,"
Blowitz my bounce and blague may scorn,

But is he " in the know f "
Condottieri sometimes come

Like Sfoeza, to the front.
Yon springald whom some deem a hum

May still prove " in the hunt."

Second Free Lance.
" A maiden knight—to me is given

Such hope, I know not fear.
I yearn to breathe the airs of heaven

That often meet me here."
Humph! In or out I shall not blench,

But later I may find
The " heaven" of the Treasury Bench

A little to my mind.

First Free Lance.
I know my trade; with lance and blade

To fame I '11 carve my way,
My foes are parlously afraid,

Whatever they may say.
Yon Briton is a Puck-like elf ;

Seems out of it at present;
But he, like me, can make himself

Confoundedly unpleasant!

Second Free Lance.
Ho, there! Where go you, good my
friend ?

You fight—beneath whose flag ?
First Free Lance.
I go for Glory! That's my end !

Second Free Lance.
And mine . May sound like brag.
First Free Lance.
Oh, not at all! We shall arrive!

But by what road,—who knows ?
I '11 show my friends that I'm alive

Second Free Lance.
And I '11 inform my foes !

[Exeunt severally.

End of Anarchy !

Order Everywhere—Mr. Punch's
Almanack for 1S89.