أنت هنا
قراءة كتاب Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 1, October 30, 1841
تنويه: تعرض هنا نبذة من اول ١٠ صفحات فقط من الكتاب الالكتروني، لقراءة الكتاب كاملا اضغط على الزر “اشتر الآن"
seemed rather to increase than diminish his boisterous merriment, the suggestions respecting the police were ordered to be adopted, and accordingly two of the force were requested to remove him from the domicile where he was creating so much discord in lieu of harmony.
Double-bass still continued deaf to all entreaties for silence and progression, and when a stretcher was mentioned grew positively furious, and insisted that, as he had a conveyance of his own, he should be taken to whatever destination they chose to select for him on, or rather in, that vehicle. Accordingly a rattle was sprung, and duly answered by two or three more of those alphabetical gentlemen who emanate from Scotland-yard, by whose united efforts the refractory musician was carried out in triumph, firmly and safely seated in his own ponderous instrument, loudly insisting that he should be conveyed
The interruption occasioned by this interesting occurrence was productive of a general clearance of 24, Pleasant-place; and the apartments which were so lately filled with airy sylphs and trussed Adonises presented a strange jumble of rough coats, dingy silk cloaks, very passé bonnets, and numerous heads enveloped in faded white handkerchiefs. Everything began to look miserable; candles were seen in all directions flickering with their inevitable destiny; bouquets were thrown carelessly upon the ground; and the very faintest odour of a cigar found its way from the street-door into the drawing-room. Then came the hubbub of struggling jarvies; the hoarse, continued inquiries of those peculiar beings that emerge from some unknown quarter of the great metropolis, and “live and move and have their being” at the doorsteps of party-giving people. What tales could those benighted creatures tell of secret pressures of hands, whispered sentences of sweet words, which have led in after-days to many a blissful union! What sighs must have fallen upon their ears as they have rolled up the steps and slammed to the doors of the vehicle which bore away the idol of the evening! But they have no romance—no ambition but to call “My lord duke’s coach.”
Then came the desolate stillness of the “banquet-hall deserted;” the consciousness that the hour of grandeur had passed away. There was nothing to break the stillness but Mrs. Applebite counting up the spoons, and Mrs. Waddledot re-decanting the remainders.
BURKE’S HERALDRY.
Our amiable friend and classical correspondent, Deaf Burke—“mind, yes”—has lately mounted a coat-of-arms, “Dexter and Sinister;” a Nose gules and Eye sable; three annulets of Ropes in chief, supported by two Prize-fighters proper. Motto,—
A SUGGESTION
For the formation of a Society for the relief of foreigners afflicted with a short pocket and a long beard.
Mr. Muntz to be immediately waited upon by a body of the unhappy sufferers, and requested to give his countenance and assistance to the establishment of an INSTITUTION FOR THE GRATUITOUS SHAVING OF DESTITUTE AND HIRSUTE FOREIGNERS.
THE GOLD SNUFF-BOX.
My aunt, Mrs. Cheeseman, is the very reverse of her husband. He is a plain, honest creature, such as we read of in full-length descriptions by some folks, but equally comprehensive, though shortly done by others, under the simple name of John Bull—as ungarnished in his dress, as in his speech and action; whereas Mrs. Cheeseman, as I have just told you, is the counterpart of plainness; she has trinkets out of number, brooches, backed with every kind of hair, from “the flaxen-headed cow-boy” to the deep-toned “Jim Crow.” Then her rings—they are the surprise of her staring acquaintances; she has them from the most delicate Oriental fabric to the massiveness of dog’s collars.
Uncle Cheeseman says Mrs. C. thinks of nothing else; no sporting gentleman, handsomely furnished, in the golden days of pugilism, ever looked upon a ring with more delightful emotions. At going to bed, she bestows the same affectionate gaze upon them that mothers do upon their slumbering progeny; nor is that care and affection diminished in the morning: her very imagination is a ring, seeing that it has neither beginning nor end—her tender ideas are encircled by the four magical letters R—I—N—G. Even at church, we are told, she divides her time between sleeping and secret polishing. It has just occurred to me, that I might have saved you and myself much trouble had I at once told you that aunt Cheeseman is a regular Ring-worm.
But, to my uncle—the only finery sported by him (and I hardly think it deserving that word), besides a silver watch, sound and true as the owner, and the very prototype of his bulk and serenity, was a gold snuff-box, a large and handsome one, which he did not esteem for its intrinsic weight; he had a “lusty pride” in showing that it was a prize gained in some skilful agricultural contest. I am sorry at not recollecting what was engraven on it; but being a thorough Cockney, and knowing nothing more of the plough and harrow than that I have somewhere observed it as a tavern sign, must plead for my ignorance in out-o’-town matters.
You can remember, no doubt, the day the Queen went to dine with the City Nabobs at Guildhall. Cheeseman hurried impatiently to London for the sole purpose of seeing the sight, and upon finding my liking for the spectacle as powerful as his own, declared I was the only sensible child my mother ever had, and adding that as he was well able to push his way through a Lunnon crowd, if my father and mother were willing, under his protection I should see this grand affair. Not the slightest objection was put in opposition to my uncle’s proposal, consequently the next day, November the 9th, 1837, uncle Cheeseman and I formed integral portions of the huge mass of spectators which reached from St. James’s to the City.
After slipping off the pavement a score of times (and in some instances opportunely enough to be shoulder-grazed by a passing coach-wheel), stunning numberless persons by explosions of oaths for clumsy collisions and unintentional performances upon his tenderest corn, we reached the corner of St. Paul’s churchyard.
Having secured by a two-shilling bargain about three feet of a form, which, I suppose, upon any other day than a general holiday like the present was the locus in quo for little dears whose young ideas were taught to shoot at threepence a week, uncle took breath, and a pinch of snuff together: he smiled as I observed, that he’d be sure to take a refresher when her Majesty passed; and though he shook his head and designated me a sly young rogue, I could clearly perceive that he was plotting to perform, as if by chance, what I had predicated as a certainty; and although nineteen persons out of twenty would have marked (in this instance) his puerility, I doubt not but that the same number are (at some periods of their existence) innocent victims to the like weakness, whether it be generated in a snuff-box or a royal