Chapter 1

Produced by Lesley Halamek, Malcolm Farmer and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net

PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI

VOLUME 93, SEPTEMBER 3rd 1887

_edited by Sir Francis Burnand_

* * * * *

SOME NOTES AT STARMOUTH.

3 P.M.--Arrive at Starmouth--the retired Watering-place at which I propose to write the Nautical Drama that is to render me famous and wealthy. Leave luggage at Station, and go in search of lodgings. Hotel out of the question--_table d'hôte_ quite fatal to inspiration. On the Esplanade, noting likely places with critical eye. Perhaps I _am_ a little fastidious. What I should _really_ like is a little cottage; two bow-windows, clematis on porch, flagstaff, and cannon (if it wouldn't go off) in front. I could achieve immortality in a place like that. Sea-view, of course, _indispensable_. Must be within sight of the ever-changing ocean, within hearing of "the innumerable laughter of the waves"--I know what the phrase _means_, though I shouldn't like to have to explain it, and the waves just now are absolutely roaring.

3·15.--Still noting; plenty of time, and Starmouth "all before me where to choose." More than a mile of Esplanade, and several brass plates and cards advertising "Apartments." Must be cautious--not throw the handkerchief in a hurry. Haven't seen the ideal place _yet_.

3·30.--Better make a beginning. Try "Blenheim House" (all the houses here either bear ducal, naval, or frankly plebeian names, I observe). Ring: startling effect--grey-mouldy old person, with skeleton hands folded on woollen tippet, glides in a ghastly manner down passage. They really ought to put up a warning to people with nerves, as M. VAN BEERS does at his _Salon Parisien_. Feel as if I had raised a ghost. Wonder if she waits on lodgers--if so, my dinners will be rather like the banquet GULLIVER had at Laputa. "Has she rooms to let at once?" "No?" "_Oh!_" Well out of _that!_

3·45.--Warming to my work. Ring at door in "Amelia Terrace." Maid appears--nice-looking girl, rather. "Have you"--I begin--when I see a boy at the ground-floor window. Don't object to boys, as a class, but this particular boy is pallid, with something round his throat, and an indescribable air about him of conscious deadliness, and pride in the unusual terror he inspires, which can only be accounted for by recent Measles. Never under the same roof with _that_ boy! He eyes me balefully, and I stare back, fascinated. "Have you," I begin again--(I am full of resource, thank goodness!) "a Mrs. WALKER--(first appropriate name that occurs to me)--staying here?" By a horrible coincidence, they _have_! She has taken the ground-floor--where that boy is! Awkward--very.... I manage to gasp out, "Then will you please mention that I called?" and retire before she can ask my name. Presence of mind, again!

4 P.M.--Still seeking. Not so fastidious as I _was_. Have given up the cottage, and clematis, and flagstaff. Only place answering that description belongs--or so I inferred, from his language--to a retired sea-captain, whom I disturbed in his nap to inquire whether he let lodgings. As it happened, he _didn't_. Then (as I very nearly went back and told him) what right had he to sport a brass plate? However, I got some good racy dialogue for the Nautical Drama out of him.

4·15.--More failures. Starmouth busy digesting, which it does publicly in bow-windows. I must _not_ be so particular. I will do without balconies--even bow-windows--but I cannot, I will not, sit on horsehair furniture.

4·20.--After all, so long as I get a sea-view, what matters? I can be nautical and dramatic on _any_ kind of chair. And "Collingwood House," too--what a name for me! I will go in. Rejected again--nothing till Thursday fortnight! I am beginning to feel like an unpopular man at a dance. I regard the people wallowing at the windows with a growing hate; they are the elect--but that is no reason why they should parade it in that ostentatious way--bad taste!... Can't get any rooms along these terraces--I subdue my pride, and try a back-street.

4·30.--Nature too strong for me--I _must_ face the sea. Surely there must be _some_ cards I have overlooked!... Thought so! staring me in the face all the time! Ring--ghost effect again--same old grey lady! She asks me, in hollow tones, what I want. I ask her whether I left my umbrella here (full of resource!) "No!" "Oh!" Back-street again after that.

4·40.--Even the back-streets will have none of me! I grow morbid. Remember words of song, entreating vague somethings (perhaps stars) "to smile on their vagabond boy"--no one smiles on me. And _I_ to have vapoured about "throwing the handkerchief." Fool--fool!... They are more sympathetic in the back-streets, though. "Starmouth is very full!" They say, complacently, "they don't know if there's any place I _could_ get into, not to say at once--they really _don't_!"

5 P.M.--Back on the Esplanade again. Why, I certainly haven't been _here_ before. Ring. While I am waiting for some one to appear, face rises at window--_the measly boy!_ Confound these terrace-houses, all alike! This time I _don't_ wait--I bolt. They will think I am a clown out for a holiday, but I can't help that.

5·15.--No, I must draw the line somewhere. At "Hatfield House," (good address this) landlady appears with eruptive face, powdered--effect not entirely happy--but I waive that. She has rooms--but the sitting-room is out at the end of a yard, and I am to get to my bed room through the kitchen! Can't write an epoch-making drama under those conditions.

5·30.--I am growing humbler--I would almost take a coal-cellar now. Think I will go back to Hatfield and recant.... I have. "Very sorry--this moment let".... "Oh!"

5·35.--_At last!_ May choicest blessings light upon the head of PLAPPER!--or rather of Mrs. PLAPPER, as her husband is out. She has taken me in! Charming rooms--not actually facing the sea, but with capital view of it round corner from bow-window. PLAPPER is an optician--wonder whether it is weak eyes, or wifely duty, that makes Mrs. P. wear blue spectacles? Everything arranged--terms most reasonable--now to recover luggage. Stop; better ask address--or I might never be able to find my optician again--like _Mrs. Barrett Browning_ and her lost Bower! "You've only got to use PLAPPER'S name, Sir, anywhere, and it will be all right," says Mrs. P. with natural pride. Very convenient. For instance: _Stern Constable_ (to me). "Can't come in here, Sir." _Myself._ "Can't I, though? _PLAPPER!_" And in I go! Or I am in a scrape of some sort: "Have you anything to say?" asks the Inspector. I whisper in his ear, "PLAPPER!" And they grovel and release me.

5·45.--Odd--but now I find myself wondering ungratefully, whether I mightn't have done better than PLAPPER, after all. This is human nature, I suppose--but discreditable. I _am_ overjoyed--really. I no longer hate people. _I_ too am an initiate! But I can pity poor devils who are houseless, I hope.... I order sundry things: "Send them in to PLAPPER'S." Luggage regained and sent back--to PLAPPER'S. I feel self-respect once more.

6 P.M.--Returning to PLAPPER'S. And in this secure retreat my Nautical drama is destined to see the light--if PLAPPER only knew! I feel an affection already for this humble temporary home. Mrs. P. meets me at the door. "So sorry, Sir--but _you can't have the rooms, after all_! PLAPPER had let 'em quite unbeknown to me!"

And this is Saturday! _I am under a curse!_

* * * * *

THE BALLET.

_Lament by the Rev. S. D. Headlam._

What was it first my fancy fed, My steps to the Alhambra led, And finally quite turned my head? The Ballet!

What, when I studied it apart, Struck me with force that made me start, As being a noble form of Art? The Ballet!

And what, when seen night after night, Inspired me with supreme delight, And made me to the _Pall-Mall_ write? The Ballet!

But what, when kindled with its fire, I hoped my Bishop to inspire, Alas! excited but his ire? The Ballet!

And what, although the orthodox Two places in an upper box I offered him,--but gave him shocks? The Ballet!

Ah! what, though every nerve I've strained To see the dancers' battle gained, Leaves me episcopally chained? The Ballet!

* * * * *

LAST FRUITS OF THE SESSION.--Pairs.

* * * * *

"The modern Venetian takes pleasure not only in neglecting but in persecuting the palace and the gondola.... As to the gondola, the mass of Venetians possess none, and rarely go in them.... They forget that the much-desired foreigner does not come to Venice to read signboards from a steamboat up and down the Grand Canal; and, by handing over this magnificent waterway to a company of foreign speculators, they have well-nigh reduced the ancient body of gondoliers to beggary. The steamers are numerous and noisy.... If one contrasts the passengers of these rival craft, the gondola and the _vaporetto_, one asks which, as a body, most contribute to the prosperity of Venice, and so merits most consideration.... The penny steamer and the gondola are irreconcileable, and cannot exist long together, for the simple reason that the gondoliers cannot earn a support, and must take to other avocations."

"EXSUL'S" _Letter to the Times on "The Venice of To-day."_

_Shade of_ CHILDE HAROLD _sings_:--

Yes, this is Venice; yon's the Bridge of Sighs; The palace and the prison, still they stand: But 'midst the maze foul funnel fumes arise. As by the touch of an enchanter's hand, A hundred such their smoky wings expand, Around me, and a dying glory smiles On what was once the poet's, artist's land, Soot smears the wingéd Lion's marble piles, And Venice reeks like Hull, throned on her hundred isles.

She looks a swart sea Cyclops, from the ocean, Rising with smutted walls and blackened towers; The _vaporetto_, with erratic motion, Muddies the waters with its carbon-showers. And such she is! Progress's dismal dowers Have spoilt the picture; now the eye may feast On garish signs and posters. Gracious powers! Sewing-machines and hair-washes at least Might spare the Grand Canal. Trade is an ogre-ish beast!

In Venice Vulcan's echoes hiss and roar, And idle sits the hapless Gondolier. His Gondola is crumbling on the shore, The Penny Steamer's whistle racks his ear. 'ARRY exults--but Beauty is not here; Trade swells, Arts grow--but Nature seems to die. Hucksters may boast that Venice is less "dear," "_Progresso!_" is the Press, the Public cry; But, by great RUSKIN'S self, the thing is all my eye.

For unto us she had a spell beyond Cheap dinners and Advertisement's array Of polychrome, of which Trade seems so fond. Alas! the Dogeless city's silent sway Will lessen momently, and fade away, When the Rialto echoes to the roar Of _vaporetti_, and in sad decay The Gondola, its swan-like flittings o'er, Neglected rots upon the solitary shore.

Such is the Venice of my youth and age, Its spell a void, its charm a vacancy. Rosy Romance, thou owest many a page, Ay, many that erst grew beneath _mine_ eye, To what was once the loved reality Of this true fairy-land; but I refuse To deck with Art's fantastic wizardry A haunt of Trade. Mine is not Mammon's Muse, _She_ will not sing for hire of Soaps, or Silks, or Shoes.

I know that there are such,--but let them go,-- They came like ghouls, they'll disappear like dreams. But oh! my Venice, dare they treat thee so? I fain would flay the Vandal horde; still teems My mind with memories of thy towers and streams,-- All that I sought for in thy midst, and found. Must these too go? The ogre Progress deems Such fair and flattering phantasies unsound; Now other voices speak, and other sights surround.

"The spouseless Adriatic mourns her lord," Ay, and yet worse, Venetian souls grow rude. The Gondola lies rotting unrestored, The Gondolier unhired must lounge and brood, Or stoop to "stoking" for his daily food, On board a puffing fiend that by "horse pow'r" Measures its might. Oh! base ingratitude! Dogs! ye one day shall howl for the lost hour, When Venice was a Queen, with loveliness for dower.

Gondolas ruled, and now the Steam Launch reigns, A stoker shovels where a lover knelt. This thing of steam and smoke that stinks and stains, Might suit the tainted Thames, the sluggish Scheldt; But the Canal, which for long years hath felt The sunshine of Romance--that downward go? This is the deadliest blow that Trade hath dealt; Enough to bring back blind old DANDOLO, To fight his country's latest most debasing foe.

Before St. Mark still glow his steeds of brass, But garish signboards glitter in the sun; And up and down the watery alleys pass The snorting steamers. Venice lost and won, Her thirteen hundred years of beauty done, Sinks to an Isle of Dogs. Let her life close! Better be whelmed beneath the waves, and shun Ev'n in destruction's depths her Vandal foes, Than live a thrall to Trade, a scourge to eyes and nose.

Dreams of Romance--all shattered! They revile Our "Ruskinismo," do these souls of dust, Who care not for their sumptuous marble pile, Oh, sons unworthy of their splendid trust! With his oar broken, and his dry keel thrust, Unused ashore, the Gondolier recalls Gay days and nights of glory, such as must Too oft remind him _who_ his land enthrals, And flings a sordid cloud o'er Venice' shining walls.

How can the Childe's poetic shade refuse To plead his cause, on his base foe make war? Perchance redemption from a phantom Muse, Whose voice now faintly echoes from afar, May come, and check his sordid conqueror's car, E'en in its roll of victory, snatch the reins, From Greed's foul hands and further havoc bar, Say, _shall_ the Penny Steamer's petty gains, Banish the Gondolier, and hush his cheery strains?

* * * * *

* * * * *

VIRTUES OF OMISSION.

PEOPLE--Mr. IMPREY, Mr. GEORGE SMITH (of Coalville), and others--are actually to be found contending for the barren honour of having invented that terrible nuisance of a catch-phrase, "Three Acres and a Cow!" Strange and morbid perversion of ambition! As well fight for the deep discredit of having been the first to hit upon such kindred controversial horrors as the boring and question-begging "gags" of "Law and Order," "Patriot first, and Party-man afterwards," "Hand over to the tender mercies, &c.," "Disintegration of the Empire," or even that most hackneyed of political phrases, "Grand Old Man" itself. Now, if any one took credit to himself for never, never having uttered the "Acre and Cow" Shibboleth, or made use of any others of these soul-sickening bits of polemical claptrap, _Mr. Punch could_ understand, and admire, and envy. There be things that _everybody_--possessed of sense and sobriety--would "rather not have said."

* * * * *

THE WAY OF THE WIND.

_By an anxious Unionist._

[Mr. T. W. RUSSELL has formally withdrawn from the Unionist Party.]

Ah! sorely tossed is our poor "Union" bark, We shall not get to port without a tussle. They say the wind will change against us. Hark! That wind seems rising; I can hear its RUSSELL.

* * * * *

A FIGHT FOR THE FORTY.--Sir EDWARD HAMLEY is, admittedly, one of the greatest strategists the British Army possesses. Although in the prime of life, this gallant officer will be "automatically retired," unless he receives a military appointment before the end of October. It has been suggested that he should be employed to work out a scheme for the protection of London. This will be far easier work for him to do than to have to frame a defence of the Government that has so long, and so strangely, and (some say) so maliciously overlooked him.

* * * * *

CON: FOR THE CONSIDERATE.--Why is Happiness like an Act of Parliament? Because you can never tell its value until it is passed.

* * * * *

ALL IN PLAY.

DEAR MR. PUNCH,

This year has been a great one for America in London. The Exhibition in West Kensington, with its Wild West Show, has attracted its thousands, and at this moment two dramas (both from the United States) are very popular in the Strand and Oxford Street. A few nights ago, anxious to save you the trouble of filling a stall with your customary urbanity and critical acumen (to say nothing of your august person and opera-glasses), I visited the Princess's, to assist at a performance of _The Shadows of a Great City_. It was really a most amusing piece, written by JEFFERSON, the _Rip Van Winkle_ of our youth, who you will remember was wont in years gone by to drink to the health of ourselves and our wives and our families at the Adelphi. The _City_ was New York, and the most substantial of the _Shadows_, Mr. J. H. BARNES, a gentleman who might be aptly described as one of the "heaviest" of our light comedians. He played a fine-hearted sailor with an earnestness of purpose that carried all before it. I cannot conscientiously say that he gave me the idea that he was exactly fitted to take command of the Channel Fleet, but after seeing him I retained the impression that he would have felt entirely at home on the quarter-deck of a Thames Steamboat. Mr. HARRY NICHOLLS, who has so often assisted to make the fortune (as a jocular scoundrel) of a Drury Lane melodrama, was also in the cast, and so was Miss CICELY RICHARDS, _the Belinda_ of _Our Boys_. Then there was Miss MARY RORKE, a most sympathetic heroine, and several other excellent performers, whose names, however, were less familiar to me.

The play, admirably mounted with capital scenery, recalled a number of pleasant memories. Here was a suggestion of _The Ticket of Leave Man_, there a notion from _The Colleen Bawn_, and yonder ideas from _The Long Strike_ and _Arrah-na-Pogue_. There is nothing new under the sun, and _The Shadows of a Great City_ is no exception to the rule. However, it is a thoroughly exciting play, full of murder and mirth, wrong-doing and waggery, startling incidents, and side-splitting comicalities. It was certainly greatly enjoyed, when I saw it, by the audience, who cheered Mr. BARNES and Miss RORKE to the echo, and hissed all their enemies to their heart's content, as a reward for the most effectively-simulated villany.

Very soon all the Theatres will be busy with the Autumn-cum-Winter Season. The first on the List is Drury Lane, which, reserving PAYNE for the Pantomime at Christmas, opens in September with _Pleasure_.

Always yours sincerely, ONE WHO HAS GONE TO PIECES.

* * * * *

SALUBRITIES ABROAD.

_Still at Royat. Hotel Continental.--À propos_ of PULLER "airing his French" Miss LOUISA METTERBRUN said something delighful to him the other day at dinner. PULLER had been instructing us all in some French idioms until Madame METTERBRUN set him right in his pronunciation. He owned that he had made a slip. "But," says he, wagging his head and pulling up his wristbands with the air of a man thoroughly well satisfied with himself generally, "but I think you'll allow that I can speak French better than most Englishmen, eh?"

Madame METTERBRUN doesn't exactly know what to say, but Miss LOUISA comes to the rescue. "O Mr. PULLER"--he is frequently at their house in London, and they know him intimately--"I always say to Mamma, when we're abroad, that I do like to hear you talk French"--PULLER smirks and thinks to himself that this is a girl of sense and rare appreciation--"because," she goes on quietly, and all at table are listening, "because your speaking French reminds me so of home." Her home is London. I think PULLER won't ask Miss LOUISA for an opinion on his French accent again in a hurry.

* * * * *

I have just been reading VICTOR HUGO'S _Choses Vues_. Admirable! _Fuite de Louis Philippe!_ What a pitiful story. Then his account, marvellously told, and the whole point of the narrative given in two lines, of what became of the brain of TALLEYRAND. Graphically written is his visit to THIERS on behalf of ROCHEFORT. Says THIERS to him, "_Cent journaux me traînent tous les matins dans la boue. Mais savez-vous mon procédé? Je ne les lis pas._" To which HUGO rejoined, "_C'est précisément ce que je fais. Lire les diatribes, c'est respirer les latrines de sa renommée._" Most public men, certainly most authors, artists, and actors, would do well to remember this advice, and act upon it.

* * * * *

"_Choses Vues_," written "_Shows Vues_" would be a good heading for an all-round-about theatrical and entertainment article in _Mr. Punch's_ pages. Patent this.

* * * * *

PULLER has recovered his high spirits. The temperature has changed: the waters are agreeing with him. So is the dinner hour, which M. HALL, our landlord, kindly permits us to have at the exceptional and un-Royat-like hour of 7·30. At dinner he is convivial. Madame METTERBRUN and her two daughters are discussing music. Cousin JANE is deeply interested in listening to Madame METTERBRUN on WAGNER. The young Ladies are thorough Wagnerites. La Contessa is unable to get a word in about SHAKSPEARE and SALVINI, and her daughter, who, in a quiet tone and with a most deliberate manner, announces herself as belonging to the "Take-everything-easy Society," is not at this particular moment interested in anything except the _menu_, which she is lazily scrutinising through her long-handled _pince-nez_.

Mrs. DINDERLIN, having succumbed to the usual first attack of Royat depression, is leaning back in her chair, smelling salts and nodding assent to the Wagnerite theories, with which she entirely agrees. For my own part, I am neutral; but as the METTERBRUNS are thorough musicians,--the mother being a magnificent pianist, and the eldest daughter a composer,--I am really interested in hearing all they have to say on the subject. Our bias is, temporarily, decidedly Wagnerian, for Cousin JANE, who is really in favour of "tune," and plenty of it,--being specially fond of BELLINI and DONIZETTI,--in scientific musical society has not the courage of her opinions.