The Comic Almanack, Volume 2 / An Ephemeris in Jest and Earnest, Containing Merry Tales, Humerous Poetry, Quips, and Oddities

BEFORE.

AFTER.

ANACREONTIC
IN PRAISE OF "SHERRY COBBLERS,"
BY
A LADY OF QUALITY.

"ANY ONE FOR EGYPT?—EGYPT!"

Of course we shall have a Railway to Grand Cairo—the London and Great Desert Direct. How the antiquaries will get over this attack upon the very seat of their learning it is impossible to say. Will they stand idly by and not resent this blow levelled at their renowned Sesostris—this slap given to their Cheops?

However, as a matter of course, there will be a continual succession of cheap trips under the influence of Crisp. Every Englishman, who can afford to spend a week and a five-pound note in the pursuit of pleasure, will be sure to go. For in addition to the "Magnificent Scenery," "Free Admission to all the Pyramids," &c. &c., the advertisements will doubtless assure us that in every town at which the train stops, a professor will be engaged, so that whilst the travellers are swallowing their soup, they may be crammed with a complete knowledge of the language of the country—a process which will enable Englishmen to digest Coptic and Oxtail at one and the same time.

This Railway will assuredly be the making of Egypt and the Egyptians. In a very little time the Desert Sara will become as lively as Cremorne, and its sands as much frequented by the ladies as those of Ramsgate while the gentlemen are bathing. Villages will spring up in the bosom of the country almost as rapidly as mustard and cress would in the bosom of an Irishman. The sources of the Nile will afford beautiful spots for picnics where parties bringing their own tea may be accommodated with hot water; and the great Lake of Mæris will of course be thoroughly repaired, and opened as a National Swimming Bath—warranted free from Crocodiles.

Then the Pyramids will be just the very place for some Mustapha Bunn to begin an operatic season in; the only thing required to be done will be to fit up each Sarcophagus as a private box; get a monster band with a mammoth ophicleide to play the Desert, and engage the celebrated vocal statue of Memnon to sing a solo. What a splendid joke too for the clown to let off on the first night of the Pantomime; when, after turning his toes in, rolling his eyes, and thrusting his tongue out, he cries, "Here we are again! Thirty centuries are a-lookin' down on us! Somebody's a-coming!" This alone would fill the Pyramids.

Then again as a place for posters, the Pyramids would soon "shut up" Waterloo Bridge. Noses and Son alone doubtless would engage one entire side of Ptolemy's, whilst Jullien would cover Cyphreus with a monster broadside.

Of course all caravans would be superseded, and camels only used for picnics and penny rides at fairs. The once-renowned Ben Haroun ad Deen will be waiting to comfort the hungry passenger, crying aloud as he stands beneath the glorious Sphinx, "Allah is good!—Baked 'taturs all hot!—and Mahomet is his Prophet. Here's your prime flowery sort!" Whilst the once bloodthirsty Ben Hassan, as he leans against the bright gas-lit Cleopatra's Needle, will lift up his voice with "May the Prophet bless you. Ham sandwiches a penny."

The salutary effect that this mixing of the English with the Egyptian will have upon our Poetry and Romance, "can be much better imagined than described,"—as George Robins used to say in every one of his advertisements. Instead of our trumpery "Wilt thou love me then as now?" and "Yes, dearest, then I'll love thee more!" we shall have good wholesome emotion, and "no nonsense," in the shape of the following little Anglo-Arabian snatch:

"For thirty days I could not eat—neither have I slept for the fleas and excessive weeping.

"Her face is like the full moon, her hair like capsicums, and her nose is the finest of Grecians.

"She moveth like the willow branch, and she speaketh Coptic with a pure Pyramidical accent.

"Her breath is like ambergris; she hath rubies and pearls, and jacinths, and heaps of red gold in the consols."

This is sterling affection if you like. There are few Englishmen who could keep a flame burning for thirty days.

When all these things are worked out, it will be time to begin agitating for that great moral change, the introduction of Polygamy into England. If true-born Britons are to be forced still to continue monogamists, what, we would ask, is to become of the surplus lady population? Either they must be induced to emigrate in a body to the Grand Sultan, or an act must be passed to make bigamy according to law. Something must be done for as matters are at present our wives are just one too many for us.

ALL A-BLOWING! ALL A-GROWING!

At the time of the French Revolution it was the fashion for ladies to wear their dresses as tight round as pillow-cases; but now-a-days all is confusion and bustle. That plaguy half-moon thing has set the ladies' dresses swelling and swelling, till it will soon take as much stuff to make a skirt as it does to make a tent. Forty years back a "full dress" would go comfortably into a bandbox, but now it is only with a great deal of pressing that more than one can be squeezed into an opera-box.

It was bad enough when "ye faire damezelles" had hoops all round, like sugar casks or painted posts; but now they are encompassed with air-tubes big enough for an atmospheric railway, and it is high time for the husbands to meddle with what they don't understand, and pick the ladies' dresses to pieces. In ten years, unless an Act of Parliament is passed to prevent the spread of feminine dresses, ladies will be such "awful swells" that there will be no coming near them. Husbands, to obtain the least "peace and quiet," will be obliged to blow their wives up not less than three times a day. Ladies' maids will be required to have lungs like an ironfounder's blast; for if, when Mary is directed to puff her mistress up into a "good figure," she cannot blow her out "nice and full," of course she will be told to suit herself with a place where "good wind" is no object. What a dreadful situation it would be for a poor dear lady of fashion if any one should call when she's en déshabillé—and consequently, by mere force of contrast, as thin as a Passover biscuit. There she would be running about the house wringing her hands, either promising, like a true Christian, to give a kiss for a blow, or else crying, like the lady with the Mackintosh life-preserver in a storm at sea, "Oh dear! Oh dear! Will nobody blow me out? Will nobody blow me out?"

One thing is certain; our parties will soon become literal "spreads," and sink into very dull affairs, for there will be no dancing, since it will be physically impossible for more than one to stand up at a time. The hornpipe—sailor's or college—is the only English pas seul, and that, we are afraid, would not exactly suit either Almack's or the ladies.

If those dreadful "dress-extenders" come into fashion, flirting assuredly must go out. It will be impossible for gentlemen, if the dear creatures keep them at such a distance—at the very outskirts as it were of their soul's idol, to come within the mortal range of the very best aimed eyeballs. A squeeze of the hand will be as rare as a squeeze at Vauxhall. The supper room on the night of a "grand spread" will be a curious place. There the gentlemen will stand, armed each with a long baker's peel with which to hand the ladies their refreshments. The greatest nicety, however, will be required in presenting a trifle, a glass of wine, or a jelly by these means, lest the whole be deposited in the fair creature's lap. Still if the ladies will persist in blowing themselves out before they come, they must not complain that they cannot eat anything when they are nearly bursting.

It would require the great prophet Moore himself to foretell all the mischief to come unless these gowns are taken in a reef or two. If a cry is raised against advertising carts for blocking up a street, what noise will the city men make to a skirt stopping the way like a dead wall! No doubt this last fact will be taken advantage of by every bill sticker in London, and many a poor dear, on returning home, will find she has been walking about all day with a three-sheet poster behind her, announcing there then were "Immense Attractions, and had been entirely re-decorated and painted."

The omnibus drivers, too, will throw up their reins to a man, unless, like Pickford's, they are allowed to charge according to size and weight, and their licences are altered from "thirteen people" to "two skirts" inside. But the most frightful picture for contemplation is, in the event of another French Revolution, what will become of the women? With those dresses they are sure to be seized for making barricades with. Three or four ladies, a carriage, and a pianoforte or two, would be better than all the paving-stones in Paris.

The ladies had better be careful, or the gentlemen in revenge will introduce the old Dutch costume.

AN AFFECTING COPY OF VERSES
WRITTEN BY
THE WRETCHED BRIDEGROOM,
ON
THE EVENING PREVIOUS TO THE AWFUL CEREMONY.

BON MOT-TO WAFERS:
OR, SEALS FOR "SHUTTING-UP" GOVERNORS, LOVERS, DEBTORS, AND CREDITORS.

It is sad pity the City of London broke off their bargain about the Connaught waste land. Everybody was waiting for the fun, when his Civic Majesty should pay his state visit to the Kingdom of Bogs that he had added to that of Gog's. How the "boys" would have laughed to see the whole procession stick fast in the mud, and the man in armour, weighed down in his own scales, sink up to his helmet in the swamp. How the "finest pisinthry" would have cheered to see the gilt coach, Lord Mayor, Recorder and all, suddenly disappear in the illigant muck.

In compliment to his new subjects, the Emperor of all the Bogs and Gogs, of course, would have ordered the faithful Birch (for spare the birch spoil the "boys") to supply a "feast" replete with every Irish delicacy of the season. The bill of fare for this most probably would have been, First Course—Praties wid de bones in 'em; Remove—the smallest taste in life of salt mate, to make the poteen come like a "rale blessin." Then to win the hearts of his new subjects the King of Cockneydom would, doubtlessly, have spoken in the richest brogue he could manage. At Donnybrook he would have chucked all the girls under the chin and called them "Macrees," and "Astores;" and delighted the men by flourishing his shillelah and crying "Och! Goroo! Goroo! Tare an 'ouns will nobody thrid on the tails of my gownd?" while, to complete the thing, he would have directed the "Mace-bearer, darlint, to feel round the tint for the bald hids of the Aldermin."

Realty our London Mayors are almost as strange animals as the Irish Bulls.

DREADFUL CASE OF AGRICULTURAL DISTRESS.

The state of the British Farmer is growing desperate. Unless something is done quickly, they will ere long become mere men of straw. As it is, the distress prevalent in the different counties has nearly reached its climax. The farmers are so tied down in Notts that scarcely any of them have tasted Champagne for the last six months. There isn't a man in Beds that dreams of hunting more than twice a-week, and Oxon, nearly mad from being driven so hard, has scarcely a dozen families in which the French language is spoken.

The great question of what will become of the British Farmer has been in part answered by Mr. Hiceter, who has become—insolvent. It appears that gentleman has for some time expected the Ploughshare of Distress to cut up his hearth, and the Harrow of affliction to dig its teeth and nails into the bosom of his family. This he has long anticipated, on account of his not having paid any rent for the last two years—indeed from the fact of farming seldom paying, Mr. Hiceter had long since learned to look upon the agricultural business as an extensive field for hoeing (owing). Mr. Hiceter complains that he has suffered much from his kidneys, which have been diseased for these last two years. His barley, he says, has run to nothing but beard. His ears, however, have been remarkably long; still, his corn has been so bad of late, that it has been as much as he could do to hobble on for this long time. Two large fields of Mangel Wurzel have been swallowed up by a Native de Paris, whom he engaged to perfect his daughters in the French tongue; and the whole of his six acres of canary seed have gone to teach the girls singing.

The sympathy of the country for miles round has been raised on behalf of the Misses Hiceter. Their accomplishments are such that if they were not born, at least they have been bred ladies of quality. In the midst of their sorrows they find great comfort in the use of the globes. They do not complain, but pass their time singing Italian duets, and they have already worked several superb ottomans. Their extreme repugnance to the disgustingly early hours, and vulgar laborious offices of a farm life, completely reconciles them to their present condition of having nothing to do. They also feel great consolation in knowing that in future they will be able to appear every evening in "low-necked dresses," without being pointed at by the ploughboys, and to dine at the much more civilized hour of seven, without being called proud by the Goodies.

In their prosperity it was ever the object of the Misses Hiceter to ennoble and refine the low manners and customs of the British Farmer. It was through their exertions that their brother, Mr. Albert Hiceter, was induced to wear a diamond ring and yellow kid gloves whilst guiding the plough. Whistling at the plough was also strictly forbidden by them among the farm servants, and white berlin gloves and meerschaum pipes rigorously insisted upon.

It is very gratifying to learn that these two young ladies have made up their minds to marry only persons of independent fortune and title, and to leave their papa as soon as they conveniently can, unless he consents to forego his filthy clay pipe before company.

We subjoin a few of the lots and purchasers at the late sale:—

Lot 5.—A capital Guernsey Cow; a first-rate Spanish Guitar; two Breeding Sows; and a lovely Chalk drawing of a "Brigand," by Miss Victoria Hiceter.—(Bought for £22 10 0 by Ensign Namby, whose features bore a great resemblance to those of the Brigand.)

Lot 8.—Thirty sacks of prime Potatoes (Early Yorks); a patent Rat-trap; a splendid Embroidered Cat; Wheelbarrow, never used; four ropes of strong Onions; six dozen of the best French Cambric Pocket Handkerchiefs; and a binocular Opera Glass.—(Sold very cheap to a Gin Spinner of the name of Baylis.)

Lot 22.—Capital Set first-rate Harness; several Embroidered Collars; sixteen Hay Forks; three rows lovely Imitation Pearls; two bushels of Buckwheat; nearly a peck of dirty White Kid Gloves (warranted cleaned only twice); and a bunch of handsome False Ringlets.—(Purchased by the Rev. G. Hodder, who complained that some of the Kid Gloves would not bear cleaning again.)

Lot 36.—Two pair of magnificent Top-boots; half an acre of fine Turnips; one quart of Lavender Water; a sack of Oats; a dozen plump Geese; six new Ostrich Feathers; and a bundle of blue Veils.—(Sold to Mrs. Glyde of the Rookery.)

Lot 54.—Magnificent Stuffed Spaniel (King Charles's breed); eight good Spades; ditto Pitchforks; two beautiful Fancy Dresses (one Circassian Slave, and one Mary Queen of Scots); several Vols. Italian Duets; splendidly bound Family Bible (not much used); large Garden Roller; and six loads strong Manure.—(Knocked down to Lady Guy Tomlins, who had brought her carriage to take them with her.)

BREACH OF PROMISE.
Ogles v. Winkin.

On the day appointed for the trial of the wretched man Mike Winkin, the rush of ladies was so terrific that, we regret to state, several highly respectable females met with severe accidents. Mrs. de Smythe Smith had her bonnet completely crushed, and her body literally torn from her. She was carried to a shop in the neighbourhood, where her head was immediately dressed; her body, however, was found to be so injured that it was thought advisable to take it off. Miss Beeves, we are sorry to say, also lost both her legs, they having been taken from under her in the scuffle.

The greatest praise is due to Mrs. Inspector Dakin of the T division, who kept up a constant and strong supply of that body.

At ten o'clock Mrs. Serjeant Blubag took her seat on the fauteuil. She was attired in a robe of poult-de-soie rose, trimmed with peau de lapin blanc garnie de demi queue de chat noir, and with her hair au cactus. On the "devotionals" beside her were seated the Misses Justice, Tracts, and Gruel.

The prisoner on being brought in was assailed with cries of "You brute! Oh, you brute!" which drowned the call of Miss Asthma the usher, for "Silence, my dears! Pray, silence, my dears!"

Miss Wartz, Q.C., the celebrated authoress of the "Trials of Women," assisted by fifteen other ladies, appeared for the prosecution; and, having laid down a lovely pair of braces that she had been engaged in working, opened the case by saying that—

In the whole of her born days she had never heard of such a downright cruel affair.

Ever since she had worn a filthy disgusting wig that covered her "seat of reason" with horse-hair.

What on earth had come to the gentlemen lately was really more than she could say.

But men's suits now-a-days were so plentiful that it was the third time she had appeared in breeches that day.

Really, marriage was made such game of now-a-days, that, terrible to tell! Hymen had completely extinguished his torch; for, as he said, "le jeu ne vaut pas la chandelle." (Great confusion and cries of "Silence, my dears! Pray, pray, my dears! let us have silence.")

The plaintiff in this case is a very good young woman, in the prime of life, and the pastrycook line;

Whose manners are lovely, morals excellent, character superb, and eel pies divine.

Early each morning defendant would seek out her shop, and stop there the whole of the day.

Paying, the great big silly, nothing but compliments for emptying the whole of the stale-tart tray.

But his promises proved only pie-crust; for he suddenly left her to make love to a cook-shop next door.

After having sworn the fondest devotion, and lived on her eel pies for a good six months or more.

And now he sends her a nasty impudent letter, saying, carrots are things he cannot a-bear;

Though, as the poor fond dear said, she was ready to dye for his sake, the very moment she heard he didn't like nice warm auburn hair.

Mrs. Sniggles was called as witness. She objected to say how old she was. Might be forty—might be twenty. On her oath, she wasn't sixty. Would swear she wasn't fifty-nine. Was perfectly well aware of the consequences of perjury; and yet would persist in affirming that she had not reached her fifty-eighth year. Objected to answer any more questions as to age. (Objection allowed.) Knew plaintiff. Had called to see her, and found the poor thing fainting. She came to a little when the chemist's young man tickled her. Plaintiff hadn't eaten enough to lie on a fourpenny-piece ever since. Wouldn't swear to a fourpenny-piece.

At this point of the case, the forewoman of the jury stated to her Honour that their minds were perfectly made up as to the guilt of the prisoner: whereupon Mrs. Serjeant Blubag proceeded to put on the black cap. It was of crêpe noir, splendidly trimmed with artificial flowers of rosemary and rue, and had a very distingué and solemn effect. Her Honour dwelt for a considerable time on the wretched man's impudent expression of countenance, asking him in a most impressive manner where he expected he would go to, and concluded by sentencing him to marriage and hard labour for the remainder of his days, as hanging was too good for him.

The defendant was then removed in the custody of Mrs. Twentystone, the turnkey, and an old maiden lady of a serious turn of mind was immediately sent for, to prepare the man for his wretched doom.