PUNCH,
OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI.

Vol. 99.

October 4, 1890.

MR. PUNCH'S PRIZE NOVELS.

NEW SERIES.—IMPORTANT ANNOUNCEMENT.

This age has been called an Age of Progress, an Age of Reform, an Age of Intellect, an Age of Shams; everything in fact except an Age of Prizes. And yet, it is perhaps as an Age of Prizes that it is destined to be chiefly remembered. The humble but frantic solver of Acrostics has had his turn, the correct expounder of the law of Hard Cases has by this time established a complete code of etiquette; the doll-dresser, the epigram-maker, the teller of witty stories, the calculator who can discover by an instinct the number of letters in a given page of print, all have displayed their ingenuity, and have been magnificently rewarded by prizes varying in value from the mere publication of their names, up to a policy of life insurance, or a completely furnished mansion in Peckham Rye. In fact, it has been calculated by competent actuaries that taking a generation at about thirty-three years, and making every reasonable allowance for errors of postage, stoppage in transitu, fraudulent bankruptcies and unauthorised conversions, 120 per cent. of all persons alive in Great Britain and Ireland in any given day of twenty-four hours, must have received a prize of some sort.

Novelists, however, have not as yet received a prize of any sort, at least as novelists. The reproach is about to be removed. A prize of £1000 has been offered for the best novel by the Editor of a newspaper. The most distinguished writers are, so it is declared, entered for the Competition, but only the name of the prize-winner is to be revealed, only the prize-winning novel is to be published. Such at least has been the assurance given to all the eminent authors by the Editor in question. But Mr. Punch laughs at other people's assurances, and by means of powers conferred upon him by himself for that purpose, he has been able to obtain access to all the novels hitherto sent in, and will now publish a selection of Prize Novels, together with the names of their authors, and a few notes of his own, wherever the text may seem to require them.

In acting thus Mr. Punch feels, in the true spirit of the newest and the Reviewest of Reviews, that he is conferring a favour on the authors concerned by allowing them the publicity of these columns. Sometimes pruning and condensation may be necessary. The operation will be performed as kindly as circumstances permit. It is hardly necessary to add that Mr. Punch will give his own prize in his own way, and at his own time, to the author he may deem the best. And herewith Mr. Punch gives a specimen of—

No. I.—ONE MAN IN A COAT.

(By ARRY O.K. ARRY, Author of "Stige Fices," "Cheap Words of a Chippy Chappie," etsetterer.)

[PREFATORY NOTE.—This Novel was carefully wrapped up in some odd leaves of MARK TWAIN'S Innocents Abroad, and was accompanied by a letter in which the author declared that the book was worth £3000, but that "to save any more blooming trouble," he would be willing to take the prize of £1000 by return of post, and say no more about it.—ED.]

CHAPTER I.

It was all the Slavey what got us into the mess. Have you ever noticed what a way a Slavey has of snuffling and saying, "Lor, Sir, oo'd 'a thought it?" on the slightest provocation. She comes into your room just as you are about to fill your finest two-handed meerschaum with Navy-cut, and looks at you with a far-away look in her eyes, and a wisp of hair winding carelessly round the neck of her print dress. You murmur something in an insinuating way about that box of Vestas you bought last night from the blind man who stands outside "The Old King of Prussia" pub round the corner. Then one of her hairpins drops into the fireplace, and you rush to pick it up, and she rushes at the same moment, and your head goes crack against her head, and you see some stars, and a weary kind of sensation comes over you, and just as you feel inclined to send for the cat's-meat man down the next court to come and fetch you away to the Dogs' Home, in bounces your landlady, and with two or three "Well, I nevers!" and "There's an imperent 'ussey, for you!" nearly bursts the patent non-combustible bootlace you lent her last night to hang the brass locket round her neck by.

POTTLE says his landlady's different, but then POTTLE always was a rum 'un, and nobody knows what old rag-and-bone shop he gets his landladies from. I always get mine only at the best places, and advise everybody else to do the same. I mentioned this once to BILL MOSER, who looks after the calico department in the big store in the High Street, but he only sniffed, and said, "Garne, you don't know everythink!" which was rude of him. I might have given him one for himself just then, but I didn't. I always was a lamb; but I made up my mind that next time I go into the ham-and-beef shop kept by old Mother MOSER I'll say something about "'orses from Belgium" that the old lady won't like.

Did you ever go into a ham-and-beef shop? It's just like this. I went into MOSER'S last week. Just when I got in I tripped over some ribs of beef lying in the doorway, and before I had time to say I preferred my beef without any boot-blacking, I fell head-first against an immense sirloin on the parlour table. Mrs. MOSER called all the men who were loafing around, and all the boys and girls, and they carved away at the sirloin for five hours without being able to get my head out. At last an old gentleman, who was having his dinner there, said he couldn't bear whiskers served up as a vegetable with his beef. Then they knew they'd got near my face, so they sent away the Coroner and pulled me out, and when I got home my coat-tail pockets were full of old ham-bones. The boy did that—young varmint! I'll ham-bone him when I catch him next!

CHAPTER II.

Let me see, what was I after? Oh, yes, I remember. I was going to tell you about our Slavey and the pretty pickle she got us into. I'm not sure it wasn't POTTLE'S fault. I said to him, just as he was wiping his mouth on the back of his hand after his fourth pint of shandy-gaff, "POTTLE, my boy," I said, "you're no end of a chap for shouting 'Cash forward!' so that all the girls in the shop hear you and say to one another, 'My, what a lovely voice that young POTTLE'S got!' But you're not much good at helping a pal to order a new coat, nor for the matter of that, in helping him to try it on." But POTTLE only hooked up his nose and looked scornful. Well, when the coat came home the Slavey brought it up, and put it on my best three-legged chair, and then flung out of the room with a toss of her head, as much as to say, "'Ere's extravagance!" First I looked at the coat, and then the coat seemed to look at me. Then I lifted it up and put it down again, and sent out for three-ha'porth of gin. Then I tackled the blooming thing again. One arm went in with a ten-horse power shove. Next I tried the other. After no end of fumbling I found the sleeve. "In you go!" I said to my arm, and in he went, only it happened to be the breast-pocket. I jammed, the pocket creaked, but I jammed hardest, and in went my fist, and out went the pocket.

Then I sat down, tired and sad, and the lodging-house cat came in and lapped up the milk for my tea, and MOSER'S bull-dog just looked me up, and went off with the left leg of my trousers, and the landlady's little boy peeped round the door and cried, "Oh, Mar, the poor gentleman's red in the face—I'm sure he's on fire!" And the local fire-brigade was called up, and they pumped on me for ten minutes, and then wrote "Inextinguishable" in