Volume 107, September 22, 1894

_edited by Sir Francis Burnand_

IN PARIS OUT OF THE SEASON.

(_With some Notes on a Detective Melodrama at the Ambigu._)

DEAR MR. PUNCH,--When I announced my intention of running over to Paris for a few days, my friend BUZZARD looked at me with a stony contempt. "To Paris?" he said, "at this time of year! Why, you must be mad. What on earth are you going to do there?" I tried to explain to BUZZARD, whose frigid superiority frightens me, that I liked Paris, that I was going there _pour me dégourdir_; that it was just as possible to breakfast at LEDOYEN'S or VOISIN'S, and to dine at DURAND'S or JOSEPH'S in September as at any other time; that a few theatres were still open; that the Boulevards were there for the _flâneur_; but I failed to penetrate his scorn, even with the most idiomatic French at my command. However, I determined that BUZZARD, like the weight of the elephant in the problem, must be neglected; and here I am in the Rue de Rivoli with another madman like unto myself. We take our _café complet_ in bed; we wear beautiful French ties, made of _foulard_, with two vast ends floating like banners in the Parisian breeze--in a word, we are thoroughly enjoying ourselves in an entirely non-British fashion--which I take, indeed, to be of the essence of a pleasant holiday. What care we for the echoes of the Trades Union Congress; for the windiest of KEIR HARDIE'S blatancies; for the malignities of Mr. CHAMBERLAIN, or the failure of Lord ROSEBERY'S _Ladas_ at Doncaster? We are in Paris, and the sight of a _cuirassier_ trotting past with his great black _crinière_ waving behind, or of the lady bicyclists scudding by in knickerbockers, excites us more than even the latest ravings of the newest woman in London. BUZZARD be blowed! You may tell him I said so.

I want to let Mr. CONAN DOYLE know that there is a great opening for him here. If I may judge by the latest detective drama, the ideas of the Parisian public with regard to the acumen and general power of a detective are still very primitive. Yet GABORIAU did something in this line, and, in the _Vicomte de Bragelonne_, did not _d'Artagnan_ show himself on the occasion of a certain duel to be a detective of unmatchable force? Still the fact remains that the play-going Parisian public is easily satisfied in the matter of detectives. Listen, if you doubt me, to a plain unvarnished account of "_La Belle Limonadière_," the "_Grand drame nouveau en cinq actes, huit tableaux_," which is now running gloomily, but with immense success, at the _Ambigu_.

_Madame de Mazerolles_, a wealthy widow, is, in the first Act, robbed and brutally murdered by her stepson, _Roland_, a dissipated young man, who is incited to the commission of the crime by his wicked mistress _Sabine_. _Vidocq_, the great representative of the new school in detection (_circa_ A.D. 1820), is away at the time, and in his absence the investigation falls to his rival _Yvrier_, who belongs to the old school. In the chamber of death _Yvrier_ soon makes up his mind that the guilty person is one _Henri Lebrun_, a faithful and gigantic old soldier, much given to beating his breast with both fists and talking at large about his services to his country, his immaculate honesty and his domestic virtues. Suddenly _Vidocq_ enters. He discovers that the assassin has entered by a certain door because a cobweb has been disturbed, he picks up a red flower dropped by the assassin, he pours contempt on the crass stupidity of _Yvrier_--all quite in the best Sherlock Holmes style. But nothing comes of it all. Poor _Henri Lebrun_, still beating his breast with fists, is arrested, and after a painful interview with his only daughter (whom he discovers to have been the mistress of _George_, the son of _Madame Mazerolles_), he becomes sublime, accuses himself quite unnecessarily of the murder he had never committed, and is marched off to prison amid the execrations of the populace, the triumph of the crass _Yvrier_, and the loudly expressed determination of _Vidocq_ to bring the guilty to justice and save the life of the innocent _Lebrun_. Time passes. _Lebrun_, overwhelmed by an entire absence of proofs, is tried and condemned to death. It is the morning appointed for his execution. The curtain rises in the upper floor of a restaurant commanding an extensive view of the guillotine. The sight-seers troop in. First of all comes _Roland_, the murderer, disguised in black as a wicked Marquis, and accompanied by the infamous _Sabine_. _Hélène Lebrun_, the daughter of the condemned man, also troops in to slow music in black. There is a commotion at the door, and the obsequious innkeeper backs on to the stage ushering in _Milord Sir John Stilton_ and his son "_Shames_." _Sir John_ is dressed in an enormous green swallow-tailed coat with brass buttons, a striped yellow waistcoat, a pair of yellow knickerbockers, and stockings brilliantly striped with red and black. On his head he wears a low-crowned hat. In one hand he carries an umbrella, while a telescope dangles from his Shoulders by a strap. In short, he is _tout-ce-qu'il-y-a de plus Anglais_. His son _Shames_ is even more aggressively British. _Sir John_ orders lunch: "_vous donner moa bifteck_" is the obvious formula. _Shames_ concurs with a "Yehs, Pappah," which provokes roars of laughter. But stay, what is this? _Sir John_ takes _Shames_ aside: they talk in beautiful French. Can it be? Yes, by Heaven, it is the great _Vidocq_ with his faithful _Coco-Latour_! We breathe again, for now we know that the innocent man is safe. The procession, however, approaches. The condemned man speaks from below to his daughter in the balcony. He declares his innocence. Now good _Vidocq_, to the rescue. Display all your arts, convict the guilty, disguised Marquis, and save the estimable _Lebrun_! But _Vidocq_ looks on impassive, a dull thud is heard and the head of the innocent rolls into the basket. Immediately afterwards _Yvrier_ staggers in. Too late, he says, he has been convinced of _Lebrun's_ innocence. At the last moment _Lebrun_ looked at him with eyes in which there was no trace of guilt. That last look did it, and now _Yvrier_ in a passion of repentance offers himself to help _Vidocq_, even in the most subordinate capacity, to track down the guilty, and to remove the stain from _Lebrun's_ name. I pass over the padding, during which _Vidocq_ appears, for no earthly reason, in numerous disguises, and come to the last scene. _Roland_ has all but killed _George Mazerolles_ in a duel, he has murdered _Sabine_, who, before dying, rounds on him, and he is now, by a strange conjunction of circumstances, in the very room in which he murdered _Madame Mazerolles_. Thither also comes everybody else. _Vidocq_, who is tracking _Roland_, discovers, through a paper belonging to the late _Madame Mazerolles_, that _Roland_, her murderer, was her son, not her step-son, and that he, _Vidocq_, is the father of _Roland_. In his youth _Vidocq_ had been a soldier. Somewhere he had met _Madame Mazerolles_. "_Nous nous sommes aimés entre deux batailles, entre deux victoires_," and _Roland_ was the fruit of their love. Horror of horrors! What is he to do? First he tells _Roland_ that he killed, not his step-mother, but his mother. At this awful intelligence, _Roland_ faints in an armchair for precisely ten seconds. Recovering himself, he is fain to escape. _Vidocq_, all his fatherly instincts aroused, says he shall. The weak _Yvrier_ consents, when suddenly, from behind a curtain, appears _Hélène Lebrun_ in black. The murderer of her father must not escape, she declares, whereupon the great detective, vowing that his son shall never be food for the guillotine, shoots him dead with a toy pistol in the region of the left waistcoat pocket. Tableau! Curtain!

There, _Mr. Punch_, you have the French _Sherlock_ on the stage. A wonderful man, is he not?

Yours, as always,

A VAGRANT.

* * * * *

ON THE WAR IN THE EAST.

(_By a Western Wonderer._)

All in the East seems so dawdling and queer! Bogus engagements, and battles _pour rire_, Militant meetings--where nobody meets-- Ghostly armies and phantom fleets; "Terrible slaughter"--with never a blow, Corpse-choked rivers that maps do not show; Wild contradiction and vagueness extreme, Faith, it all reads like some Flowery Land dream, Arabian-nightish, and opium-bred, Japanese-spookish, delirium-fed, Wild, willow-patternish; sort of a "War" JOHNNY might paint on a blue ginger-jar. Wonder how long such a queer war will wag on? No one can tell--when 'tis _Dragon_ v. _Dragon_!

* * * * *

THANKS TO THE "BYSTANDER."

I am glad to see the "BYSTANDER" in the _Graphic_ has recently uttered a startled protest against the fashion, now somewhat overdone, and occasionally objectionably done, of lady-begging for charitable purposes in the London streets. On the sudden apparition of one of these merry half-sisters of charity (were not the Pecksniffian daughters Charity and Merry?) Mr. ASHBY STERRY became well-nigh hysterrycal, and his generosity being temporarily paralysed, he fled, with pockets tightly buttoned. For the moment he was no longer the "BYSTANDER," whose motto is that of _Captain Cuttle_, "Stand by," but, as though he had heard the command to "Stand and deliver," our sturdy "BYSTANDER" became a fugitive from before the face of the giddy charity girl, and thus at one "go" saved his halfpence and his honour. For his reputation would have suffered had he impolitely rebuffed his fair unfair assailant. He did well to flee, he did still better to write and publicly complain. We trust that this process adopted by _the_ Sterry O'Type (a fine old Irish title by the way) may have its due influence, and that the abuse, which has become thus Sterry O'Typed, of a fashion good in itself and its origin, may soon cease to exist. _En attendant_, _Mr. Punch_ is pleased to know that the "BYSTANDER" is still running on, and not likely to come to a standstill.

* * * * *

A ST. LEGER COINCIDENCE.

DEAR MR. PUNCH,--Will you afford me a small portion of your space to put on record once and for ever a most extraordinary coincidence? Last Wednesday afternoon I was taking a country walk, when all at once my eye was suddenly caught by a throstle. At the same time I accidentally looked at my watch. It had stopped at 12.10. When I got home I mentioned both of these circumstances to my wife.

Later in the evening I bought an evening paper, and was amazed to find that the St. Leger had been won by _Throstle_ (the bird I had seen), which had started at 50 to 1 (the exact minute at which my watch had stopped)! Could the force of coincidence farther go? The Society of Psychical Research and Mr. STEAD are welcome to this incident. The only thing which troubles me at all is that the evidence (other than my own) is a little slender. My wife is deaf, and never heard what I told her. The bird has flown. My watch is going again. I inclose my card, and am,

Yours STEAD-Y to a degree,

ONE WHO WON NOTHING ON THE RACE.

* * * * *

Mr. Punch, on Peeler Piper.

["I wish," said Mr. LANE, the North London magistrate, "to express my sense of the very great courage and resolution exhibited by Constable PIPER in this case, under circumstances of considerable pressure, danger, and exhaustion."--_Times' Police Report, Sept. 12._]

Peeler PIPER prov'd his plucky pecker. As Peeler PIPER prov'd his plucky pecker, Where's there pluckier pecker Than Peeler PIPER'S proved?

* * * * *

PROBABLE ANNOUNCEMENT.--New Book:--_A Mischievous Medlar._ By LESLIE KEITH, the fruitful Author of _A Troublesome Pair_.

* * * * *

* * * * *

A MOAN FROM MITCHAM

_(See "Indignant's" Letter in "Westminster Budget.")_

We once had a Common at Mitcham, Where boys would bring wickets and pitch 'em, That devouring wolf The fanatic of golf Established a club, And--aye, there's the rub!-- The Conservators sacrificed needs of the Public on purpose to help and enrich 'em! The Common they soon will be shutting In the interests of driving and "putting." The balls fly about and hit kids in the eye, And frighten old fogies, and make horses shy. The public's "wired" out while the golfers "wire in," They have got lots of brass, but they pay little tin. They drive sheep and cattle, and boys in their teens. And nursemaids and prams off their bothering "Greens." Oh, _Punch_, can't you pitch in, and pitch 'em, These bores, off our Common at Mitcham? Authority here at Monopoly winks, But I am an old Mitcham-lover who thinks That the Links on our Common should be _Missing_ Links!

* * * * *

Question and Answer.

_Ingoldsby's Question._

"TIGER TIM, come tell me true, What may a nobleman find to do?"

_Modern Idiot's Answer._

Squeak out the "chestnut" (_he_'ll well know which!) "I can't afford it; I'm far too rich!"

* * * * *

A HOPELESS CASE.

A VERY UN-VIRGILIAN PASTORAL ECLOGUE.

INTERLOCUTORS--_Ceres and a Northern Farmer, newest style._

["In several instances last week the prices for new wheat were quoted at 16_s._ to 19_s._ per quarter in Lincolnshire and Yorkshire, and the general average for the whole country last week was actually only 27_s._ 7_d._ It is over two hundred years since anything like so low a price has been quoted for wheat in England."--_Westminster Gazette._]

_Farmer (throwing down newspaper)._

Dubbut loook at the waäste! Foine feälds? A' dear! a' dear! 'Tisn't worth nowt a haäcre; 'tis worse than it wur laäst year!

_Ceres (entering)._

Good evening, Farmer, my friend! I think you will own this time I have sent you a golden harvest. I never saw wheat more prime!

_Farmer._

And who ma' _yew_ beä, Marm? And what dost tha meän, Marm--_yew_? I weänt say tha be a loiar, but tha say'st what's nawways true.

_Ceres._

Why, I am the farmer's friend, the goddess of farms and fields. At my look the furrows spring, and my laugh the harvest yields.

_Farmer._

Then wheer' asta beän saw long, leäven me a-liggin' aloän? Friend? Thoort nowt o' a friend, leävin' meä to groomble and groän.

_Ceres._

Why, what is the matter now? You've a bumper harvest, men say, The wheat and the barley show fair, and likewise the oats and the hay!

_Farmer._

_Thee_ be the goddess o' feälds? Oh, a prutty goddess tha beäst! Seems to meä tha knaws nowt, and tha beänt na use, not the leäst. Naw soort o' koind o' use to saäy the things that ya do! Goddess? My owd lass BESS wur a better goddess than yew! Sartin-sewer I be if 'tis theä and thet Clerk o' the Weather Arranges the craps and things, ye're a pair o' toättlers together!

_Ceres._

That is ungrateful, Farmer! Just glance at those golden sheaves! Phoebus and I have done it, yet who in our love believes?

_Farmer._

Luvv it ma beä, but I reckons tha'st boäth o' tha mooch to larn. Whut good o' a full-sheäved feäld, whut good o' a full-choked barn, If markets beänt no better, but woorse--as the chap saays here-- Than they have beän in Owd England fur well-neigh two oonderd year?

_Ceres._

I am not the goddess of markets!

_Farmer._

Naw, naw! Thou 'rt a useless jade. Whut use o' taturs, and turmuts and wheat, if tha ain't gut trade? Whoy, your weather hallus cooms o' the sort as we doänt desire; If we want sun ya send water, and if we want water 'tis fire. Then they Parlyment fellers fret us a-lettin' they furrineers in. We take no koind o'care of ourssens, and tha furrineers win; And if tha weäther be bad, whoy we hän't naw craps at äll. And if tha weäther be fair, whoy the market proices fäll. And tha calls thaself a goddess, and the British farmer's friend! And we're goin' from woorse to woost, and a aäsk tha, wheer will it end?

_Ceres (sadly)._

Well, I've sent you a golden harvest, good friend, though your greeting's cold.

_Farmer (furiously)._

_Wheer's the good o' a golden harvest if I canna change it for gold?_

* * * * *

* * * * *

LYRE AND LANCET.

(_A Story in Scenes._)