Puck — August 22, 1877 — page 2: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

“PUCK No. 13 North William Street, New York FOR SALE BY ALL NEWS DEALERS. Terms To Suascripers. One Copy one year, or $2 numbers... One Copy, six months, or 26 aumbers Copy for thirteen weeks Postrace Pres Notice to Authors and Artists. are solicited. Address all manu- itor * Peck”, th Witham St, New York, ND AT HOME. CONKLING ABROAD ~~ Q[GHE great New York Senator, he of the AY, ambrosial locks and Hyperion’s curls, <* the eloquent supporter of the Electoral Commission Bill, has been to Europe. He doesn't like Europe. We don’t blame him for that. America is good enough for us in every respect; but if a three weeks’ run round London and Paris renders even a massive intellect like ’s competent to judge of Europe and its institutions—he is a much more wonderful man than we took him for. ‘That our British cousins are a long way behind us in many things cannot be denied, ‘They have a Queen, a Court, a House of Lords, who by heredi- tary right have an influence on. legislation for free-born Englishmen. ‘They buy and sell church livery. ‘They can’t keep hotels; they scarcely know what ice-water is; clan. bakes ‘they are innocent of. ‘To ask for a glass of lager in London would make the pretty barmaid say: ‘A’ done now, don’t be ‘umbug- ging.” Pullman cars are not common, nor are peanuts. ‘The bootblacks rarely shout “shine,” and we don't think buckwheat cakes, green corn, root-beer, or Boston baked beans, could be obtained for love or money. It is also a melancholy fact that about half the land is in the hands of two or three hundred bloated aristocrats, while it is too true that trade is depressed, and that mechanics and the laboring classes do not get high wages. Now, what a contrast to our glorious country, | where one can not only get all these things, but | a great many more, too! Here we have no of Sutherland and Buccleuch, or Mar- of Westminster and Bute, but a ‘Tom Scott, a Garrett, and a Vanderbilt, who may perhaps exercise as much influence as the Eng- lish noble land monopolists. _ Besides we have, and have had, many specialities in which Great Britain is singularly deficient. She hasn't a | cabinet minister who traffics in post-trader- | ships. She hasn't an army ring, or an Indian ring, or a credit mobilier scandal, or a navy ring. Nor does this effete monarchy possess a civil service, the prizes in which are allotted as rewards for miserably partisan political ser- | vices, regardless of the competency of the incumbent. We can also enter into favorable competition with Great Britain in the matter of the administration of justice. While we elect our judges, who are nothing if not politicians, and amuse ourselves by impeaching one or two occasionally, she appoints hers, and charges against any one of them is an almost unheard-of thing. But this is a free country—so free that | a goodly number of people who have money | enough to ignore the law do so comfortably Senator Conkling is proud of his State—so he ought to be; but is he proud of Senator John Morrissey, for instance, who sells pools and keeps “a club?” But perhaps the law makes an exception in favor of such a nice, enter- prising influential man, As Mr. Conkling saw so much, he ought to tell us if Mr. Bright, or the | eral Howard was sent to the west for. | his tomahaw Lord Mayor, or any of the alderman of the city PUCK. of London follow in Morrissey’s footsteps, and, at the same time, to let us know what length of residence in a country is necessary to enable an intellectual Senator to express decided opinions on its institutions. At all events, whatever Senator Conkling’s experiences may have been, there can be no doubt that his trip abroad has awakened in his noble bosom a sudden and warm appreciation of our German fellow-citizens. He has grown emphatic, yea almost extravagant in their praise. But did he need go abroad to dis- cover the virtues of Germany? Couldn't he | have found them at home? Isn't Hoboken teeming with ‘leutonic loveliness—and in New York city, do not the ways of Greenwich street lead to untarnished German rectitude, where our modern Diogenes can go his ancient proto- type several better and find more than one honest man ? But the Greek philosopher got ahead of his modern disciple this way: he didn’t want any votes when he found his honest man. Our American Diogenes does—by a large majority. THE « BIG INJUN” FIGHTER. GAT HEN General O. O. Howard girds up P his loins for battle, unsheathes his mighty blade, and. puts on his war- paint, there is rejoicing in the camp of the Nez Perces. For the great pale-face warrior is a terror only in the limited circle of the Freed men's Bank. ‘There, indeed, he fulfills his mi sion as a Christian Statesman, and the average freedman feels qualmish at the mere mention of his name. Butasan Indian fighter General O. O. Howard is what the theatrical people would call a “duffer.” He goes through the war-like pre- parations above-mentioned; he raises his eyes to heaven and appeals to the God of Battles, and, then, as a dilapidated stove-pipe hat ap- pears above the horizon, and some one suggests that it may cover the head of a drunken half- breed, the representative uf the military power of the United States folds up his tents and steals away with even more elegance and_precision than characterized his performance of a similar feat in Washington, a few years ago. It is perfectly true that this is not what Gen- There were several objects in getting him into that region, but this was not one of them. It was desired that his original and unconventional financial policy should have free scope. It was hoped that by some unexpected chance he might be beguiled into a fight with an Indian, and that the Indian might be a healthy one. But the awful possibility of the General striking eS) for the settlements at this early date was not | contemplated, and it is satisfactory to know that the Government has refused with decision to withdraw the doughty hero from his present field of operations. And now when the death-cry of “ Extermi- nation!” rings from the adjacent hills, the tru- lent redskin jumps into the air, exclaims: “You don’t say so!” in Nez Percian, sharpens with a keener relish, and proceeds to slaughter his exterminators with a vigor that is perfectly delightful. “Tus may seem a work of supererogation,” he remarked, as he toddled down to the front gate, and commenced operations on the hinges with a feather and a bottle of oil, ‘but the cri- tical period is approaching when a young man has to be handled very delicately, and just the least leetle bit of a set-back may throw things. ‘The smallest creak might be disastrous; and this gate’s got to stand for two girls more besides Imogene.” Puckerings. - Ixptans do not kiss, and the gay and festive yum-yum resoundeth not from the hills, when the noble red man wooeth his young bride on a swinging gate in the moonlight. Ir may be a too fanciful reflection, but it strikes us that the undertaker, when he gets to heaven himself, must be received rather coolly, as it were, by the assembled company. “Bounce to Bulgaria, mighty monstrosity!” Cries the Jerseyman warding the Skeeter off, “Go and set up for a first class atrocity— Ishmalokrishnivareeteroff!" Wuen a man in California sustains a severe domestic affliction, such as the loss of a wife or | & child, and needs balm for his stricken soul, he knocks the life out of a Chinaman, and bears sD. against earthly woes with becoming forti- tude. ments of misguided virtue signed the tempe- rance pledge, and now the agony these fifty- five thousand endure, every time they pass a painted schooner of beer with a bigs in the middle of it, is beyond all paragraphic utter- ane i} | Firry-rive thousand men in Ohio in mo | Ir there is one thing of most ineffable grandeur in all the vast realm of nature, it is the look of | lofty scorn which mantles the brow of the noble tramp, as he remarks: ‘Baker's bread, by Jingo! When will all-conquering science teach these groveling plebeians that borax is bad for | the stomach of the true aristocrat?” And then he chucks it under a hedge. Wuere is Gail Hamilton? Has she fled to some verdant isle of far Cathay where, stretched upon the shining sands, her brow bared to the spice-laden breeze and her feet dabbling in the pellucid waters of the auriferous rivulet, she toys with the sheeny snakes that hide amid the clustering vines, and echoes back the call of the variegated paroquet? Or is she up in the garret writing another buster ? ‘Tne course of true love never did run smovth, and we don’t suppose there is any use trying to make it; but if the troubled waters of a man’s affections are to have oil of vitriol poured over them, as happened to the lover of the widow Gras in Paris, the blind god ought to be put to bed with a mustard-plaster, and not allowed to get up again until he knows how to behave himself. Divesrep of your duster, and travel-stained and choked with coal-dust, how inexpressibly delightful it is, after you've registered at a fash- ionable summer-hotel, and have been shown to your room by the nigger bell-boy, to have him, unprovoked, commence to play the devil's tat- too on you with a whisk. For the time being, the fifteenth amendment seems an egregious failure. Anp now Summer bears on her broad and bounteous breast the infant Autumn, and watches her own life fading as the child waxes strong and lusty. And the gentlemanly ushaire, with centrally-parted hair, emerges from his Summer retirement and practices before the mirror to regain the professional bland air as he remarks: ‘Eighteenth seat down that row, sir, right next to the old lady with the spectacles and the apple!” comicbooks.com