Punch (99.1890)

216

PUNCH, OE THE LONDON CHARIVAKI.

[November 1, 1890.

IN OUR GARDEN.

VERY odd thin?. Just as
we had got into Our Garden,
were, so to speak, turning up
our sleeves to hoe and dig, I
have been called away. It is
Mr. G. who has done it. The
other day the Member for
Sark and .1 were out weeding
the walk—at least he was
weeding, and I was remarking
to him on the healthfulness of
out - door occupation, more
especially when pursued on
the knees. Up comes the gar-
dener with something on a
pitchfork. Thought at first it
was a new development of the
polyanthus. (We are always
growing strange things. The
Member for Sark says, " In
Our Garden it is the unex-
pected that happens.") Turned
out to be a post-card. Our
gardener is very careful to keep up our new character. If the missive had been
brought to us in the house, of course it would have been served up on a plate.
In the garden it is appropriately handed about on a pitch-fork.

" My dear Toby " (this is the post-card), " I'm just going up to Edinburgh;
another Midlothian Campaign; You have been with me every time ; don't desert
me now; have something quite new and original to say on the Irish Question ;
would like you to hear it. Perhaps you never heard of Mitchelstown ? Been
looking up particulars. Mean to tell the whole'story. Will be nice and fresh ;
come quite a shock on Baleoub. Don't fail; Yours ever, W. E. G."

Didn't fail, and here I am, not in Our,Garden, but in Edinburgh. Left the
Member for Sark in charge. A little uneasy; never know from day to day
what his well-meant but ill-directed energy may not achieve. At least the
celery will be safe. One day, after I had worn myself out with watching gardener
dig trench, Sark came along, and in out absence filled it up. Said it looked
untidy to have long hole like that in respectable garden. Supposed we had
been laying a drain; quite surprised we weren't pleased, when he gleefully
announced he had filled it up.

Just come back from great meeting in Corn Exchange. Difficult to realise
that it 's eleven years since Mr. G. here in first campaign. A great deal hap-
pened in meantime, but enthusiasm just the same. Mr. G. I suppose a trifle
older, but Rosebeby still boyish-looking. Proceedings opened with procession
of Delegates presenting addresses to Mr. G. Excellently arranged; reflects
great credit on Pat Campbell. (Capital name that for manager of variety
troupe.) Leading idea was to present imposing representation of Liberal Scotia
doing homage to its great chief. Pat caught on at once. Engaged thirty stal-
wart men: none of your seedy sandwich-board fellows; responsible-looking
burghers of all ages and sizes. Got them together in room at left door of stage
—I mean of platform; free breakfast; oatmeal cake ; unstinted heather-honey
and haddocks. Mr. G. seated in chair in very middle of stage, the place, you
know, where great tragedians insist upon dying. Prompter's hell rings; Dele-
gates file in, every man with what looks like a red truncheon in right hand;
advance slowly along front of stage till reach chair where Mr. G. sits, appa-
rently buried in deep thought.

" What ho !" he cries, looking up with a start.

"My liege," says the sandwich-board man—I mean the Delegate,"I bring
hither the address of the Possilpark, Lambhill, Dykehead, Camburnathen, Wishaw,
Dalbeattie, Catrine, and Sorn Liberal and Radical Association. Will I read it ?"

" I think not," said Rosebeby, quietly, but firmly, and
the Delegate, handing the red thing to Mr. G., passed on.

Mr. G. smiling and bowing; audience applauded;
next man comes. He's from the Duntocher, Faifley,
Slamannan, Cockpen, Pennicuik, Clackmannan, Car-
noustie, Kirkintilloch, and Lenzie Junior Liberal Asso-
ciation. He also wants to read the Address, but is mer-
cifully hustled off, and the line, ever emerging from
L. of stage, crosses, and passes on. At other side, Pat
Campbell waiting; a little anxious lest anything should
go wrong to spoil his carefully-devised plan. But every-
thing went well.

" Get ye away now," Pat whispered in ear of the man
from Possilpark, &c.

Possilpark, &c, at the clue, darted round rear of stage ;
got round in good time to L.; fell into line, and was
ready to come on again. Same with the rest. Immense
success 1 At the end of first three-quarters of an hour,
Pat Campbell arranged a block ; pressure of innumerable
Delegates so great, doncha, couldn't move off the stage
in time. This gave opportunity for two of the stoutest
burghers to go through quick change; reappeared,
dressed in kilts. This fairly fetched down house.

"The interminable procession," as Rosebeby slyly
called it, might have gone on till now, so perfect were
the arrangements. But there was some talk of Mr. G.
making a speech, and, at end of hour and fifty minutes
the last Delegate slowly crossed in front of delighted
audience, handed his red baton to Mr. G., who, though
he had entered thoroughly into the' fun of the thing, was
beginning to look a little fagged, and the speaking began.

This was excellent, especially Rosebeby's introduction
of the travelling Star; a model of terse, felicitous lan-
guage. Only one hitch here. Speaking of Mr. G.'s
honoured age, he likened him to famous Doge of Venice,
" old Dandolo." Rosebeby very popular in Edinburgh.
But audience didn't like this; something like groan of
horror ran along crowded benches.

"Nae, nae," said one old gentleman, momentarily
taking his knees out of the small of my back, "that
winna do. 'Auld Wtjllie' is weel enoo, but to ca' a
man Auld Dandolo to his face gars me greet." (Often met
with this phrase in songs and Scotch novels: curious to
see how it was done; fancy, from what followed, it's Scotch
for taking snuff.)

Barring this slip, everything went well. Gladstone
delightful. So fresh, so informing, and so instructive!
Began with lucid account of Battle of Waterloo; lightly
sketched the state of parties at the period of the Reform
agitation in 1832 ; glanced in passing at the regrettable
conflict between the Northern and Southern States of
America ("sons of one mother" as he pathetically put
it); and so glided easily and naturally into a detailed
account of the melee at Mitchelstown, which, as he in-
cidentally mentioned, took place four years and a half ago.

Audience sat entranced. You might have heard a
pin drop, if indeed you wanted to. I wish the Member
for Sark had been here to hear it. He would have
been much more usefully employed than in that hopeless
pursuit to which he has given himself up, the growing of
the peelless potato. He '11 never do it.

Coenwall in Bakeb Stbeet.—The worst of Cornwall
is, it is so far off—indeed, it has hitherto been quite out of
sight. Everything comes to him who knows how to wait.
We waited, and Mr. John Holllngshead brought Niagara
to Westminster. We waited again, and Mr. Abthub
Vokxns brings Cornwall to Baker Street, and introduces
us to a very clever young sea-scapist, Mr. A. Wabnje-
Beowne—altogether a misnomer, for he isn't a worn
brown at all, he is as fresh and bright and sharp as anewly-
minted sovereign. Go and look at his "Lizard and Stags "
—he isn't an animal-painter, though the title looks like it
—his "Breaking Weather," his "Main Veils," his "Innis
Head," or any one of his thirty pictures, and say if you
don't agree with Mr. Punch. The whole of them are so
true to Nature, are so faithful in their wave-drawing, there
is such a breeziness, such a saltness pervades them through-
out, and they fso accurately convey the character of the
Cornish coaBt, that Mr. P. felt quite the Cornishman, and
is unable to decide whether he is the Tre Punch or the Pol
Punch. On mature deliberation, he concludes he is the
Pen Punch. There's no doubt about that!

The Well "Pkotected" Female.—Mrs. Columbia.

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