Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 102, January 9, 1892

Name: Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 102, January 9, 1892
Author: Various

by Various

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English wit and humor -- Periodicals

In: Punch·Humour·British Literature

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Punch,

OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI.

VOL. 102.

January 9, 1892.

ON A NEW YEARLING.

(SECOND WEEK.)

My fire was low; my bills were high; My sip of punch was in its ladle; The clarion chimes were in the sky; The nascent year was in its cradle. In sober prose to tell my tale, 'Twas New Year's E'en, when, blind to danger, All older-fashioned nurses hail With joy "another little stranger."

The glass was in my hand--but, wait, Methought, awhile! 'Tis early toasting With pæans too precipitate A baby scarce an outline boasting: One week at least of life must flit For me to match it with its brothers-- I'll wager, like most infants, it Is wholly different from others.

He frolics, latest of the lot, A family prolific reckoned; He occupies his tiny cot, The eighteen-hundred-ninety-second! The pretty darling, gently nursed Of course, he lies, and fondly petted! The eighteen-hundred-ninety-first Is not, I fancy, much regretted.

You call him "fine"--he's great in size, And "promising"--there issue from his Tough larynx quite stentorian cries; Such notes are haply notes of promise. Look out for squalls, I tell you; soft And dove-like atoms more engage us; Your fin-de-siècle child is oft Loud, brazen, grasping, and rampageous.

You bid me next his eyes adore; So "deep and wideawake," they beckon; We've suffered lately on the score Of "deep and wideawake," I reckon. You term me an "unfeeling brute," A "monster Herod-like," and so on-- You may be right; I'll not dispute; I'll cease a brat's good name to blow on.

Who'll read the bantling's dawning days?-- Precocious shall he prove, and harass The world with inconvenient ways And lisped conundrums that embarrass? (Such as Impressionists delight To offer each æsthetic gaper, And faddists hyper-Ibsenite Rejoice to perpetrate on paper?)

Or, one of those young scamps perhaps Who love to rig their bogus bogies, And set their artful booby-traps For over-unsuspicious fogies? Or haply, only commonplace-- A plodding sort of good apprentice, Who does his master's will with grace, And hurries meekly where he sent is?

And, when he grows apace, what blend Of genius, chivalry and daring, What virtues might our little friend Display to brighten souls despairing? What quiet charities unknown, What modest, openhanded kindness, What tolerance in touch and tone For braggart human nature's blindness?

Or what--the worser part to view-- Of wanton waste and reckless gambling, What darker paths shall he pursue With sacrilegious step and shambling? What coarse defiance, haply, hurl At lights beyond his comprehension-- An attitudinising churl Who struts with ludicrous pretension.

I know not--only this I know, They're getting overstrained, my ditties, This kind of poem ought to flow Less like a solemn "_Nunc Dimittis_." 'Twas jaunty when I struck my lyre, And jaunty seems this yearling baby; But, as both year and song expire They're sadder, each, and wiser, maybe.

Air--"_hi-tiddley-hi-ti!_"

I'm a young writer grimly gay, My volumes sell, and sometimes pay. First log-rollers raised a rumour of a rising Star of Humour, Who had faced the Sphinx called Life, With amusing misery rife, So with sin, and woe, and strife, I thought I'd have a lark. With pessimistic pick I pottered round Pottered round, A new "funny" trick I quickly found, Smart and sound, Life's cares in hedonistic chuckles drowned, You be bound! The cynic lay I found would pay, In a young Man of Mark!

CHORUS.

All of you come along with me! I'm for a rare new fine new spree! Everybody is delighted when the Philistines are slighted, All of you come my books to try! I-twaddley-I-ti I-I-I, Ego for ever! Buy! Buy! Buy! And I'm all right!

Down with the West I go; my pen Is bound to "fetch" the Upper Ten, With the aid of some "log-rolling," my "distinction" much extolling. Smart little scribes from near and far Say, with a sniff, "O here's a Star!" DICKENS on fine souls doth jar, THACKERAY is too dry, But his pessimistic air, rich and rare, Subtle, fair, Makes Philistia to stare, in a scare, And to blare; Whilst true Critics débonnaire, who are rare, With a flaire, For true humour, Swell of rumour The gregarious cry.

CHORUS.

All of you come along with me! You'll have a rare new fair new spree! Paradox with "sniff" united, Poor Humanity snubbed and slighted. Humour's new cuvée, extra-dry. I-twaddley--high-dry-high-toned I! Come and worship the pessimist "I" For that's all right!

After I've taken the toffish Town, A second edition, at Half-a-crown, Seeks the suffrages--(and money, for on Swelldom you'll go "stoney")-- Of the much derided Mob. Yes, the Proletariat "Bob" (With the Guinea of the Nob) must aid the Sons of Light. Gath and Askelon, you see, can give Me, L.S.D. All true Egoists love those pregnant letters Mystic Three! Flout Philistia with great glee, fair and free, But agree To take its "tin," Though with a grin Of pessimistic spite.

CHORUS.

All of you come along with me! 'ARRY, who loves a fair old spree! "Mugwump" with fine morgue delighted, Cynic at "yearnestness" sore frighted! All of you come my "tap" to try! I-twaddley-high-dry-high-toned I! Come along, boys, Buy! Buy! Buy! And I'm all right!

My name is GINGER JIMMY, and I live, when I'm to hum, In Rats Rents, the kind o' nay'brood wot the Swells now calls a Slum. I'm a bit thick in the clear, like, and don't quite know wot they mean, But I guess it isn't mansions, and I'm sure it isn't clean.

They are always on the job now about Slums, and they do say They are going to clear our Court out on the suddent some fine day. Whether it's roads, or railways, or hotels, blowed if I know; Only 'ope they'll give us notice, and some place where we can go.

'One is 'ome, if but a dungheap; if you're pitchforked out of that, And turned loose in chilly London on the scoop, like a stray cat, With yer bits o' sticks permiskus in a barrer or a truck, I can tell yer you feels lost like, and fair down upon yer luck.

Heviction? When you're stoney-broke, your dubs all hup the spout, And you've nix to raise the rent on, I suppose you must turn hout; 'Cos without them "rights o' proputty" no country couldn't jog; But that brings a cove small comfort when 'e's 'ouseless, in a fog!

I 'ave knocked about a middlin' little bit, you bet I 'ave, And I ain't what Barber BIDDLECOMBE would call "a heasy shave"; But these Sanitary codgers give me beans, and no mistake. I am fly to most all capers, but don't tumble to their fake.

Seems to me all sentimental jor and cold chuck-out, it do. They may call their big Committees, and may chat till all is blue, But to shift me till they gives me somethink sweeter is all rot; Better leave my garret winder, and the flower in the pot.

That gerenum there looks proper; which I bought it of a bloke What does the "All a-blowin'!" with a barrer and a moke; And though tuppences is tuppences, I ain't so jolly sure As to spend two-d. upon it were to play the blooming cure

NICKY SPRIGGINS did chi-ike me. Reglar nubbly one is NOCK, With about as much soft feelink as a blessed butcher's block. He'd a made a spiffing Club Swell if he'd ony 'ad the chink, With them lips like a ham sandwidge, and them eyes as never blink.

And I ain't no softy, neither, bet your buttons. That don't pay, For you're 'bliged to keep yer eyes peeled and to twig the time o' day; But I've got a mash on flowers; they are better than four 'arf, Them red blazers in my winder; so let NOCKY 'ave his larf!

NOCKY tells me that the Westry means a-clearin' hout our place For to make a bit o' garding, wot they calls a Hopen Space, O I know the sort o' fakement, gravel walks, a patch o' grass, And a sprinkle of young lime-trees of yer Thames Embankment class.

Some bloke spots the place as likely, and praps buys it on the cheap, (Spekylators keeps their lids hup though the parish nobs may sleep,) Pooty soon the pot's a-bilin' about Hopen Spaces. Yus! And the chap as bought the bit o' ground is fust to raise the fuss.

Recreation for the People, Hopen Playgrounds for the Young! That's the patter of the platformers; and don't they jest give tongue! Well, it's opened with a flourish, and there's everyone content; Pertiklerly the landlords round as nobbles better rent.

But I don't object to gardings, not a'mossel--t'other quite; As I've said, a bit of green stuff and a flower is my delight; I wish London wos more hopen, and more greener, and more gay; Only people down our Court has got to live as well as play.

If they clears out the arf acre where we huddles orful close, We must all turn out, that's certain; where we'll turn to, goodness knows; And it won't be werry spashus, the new "Park" won't, arter all, With the graveyard railinks one side, and on t'other a blank wall.

Wot we want is decent 'ouses, at a rent as doesn't take 'Arf a cove's poor screw to pay it. That 'a the present landlord's fake! If they only knowed 'ow 'ard it is to meet "Saint Monday" square, When yer ealth is werry middlin', and the jobs is werry rare!

P'raps them Dooks, and Earls, and Marquiges, and Kernels, wot they states Has just clubbed theirselves together to keep down the bloomin' Rates, And to smash the Kounty Kouncil, as they've bunnicked the Skool Board, Jest a few of their hodd moments to our naybrood might afford.

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