Puck — December 19, 1877 — page 2: what you’re looking at

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

PUCK. “PUCK”, No. 13 North William Street, New York. FOR SALE BY ALL NEWS DEALERS. Terms To Sunscripers. One Copy one year, or 52 numbers. One Copy, six months, or 26 nt Que Copy for thirteen weeks.. Postace Ferm. ~ CHRISTMAS. E can scarcely claim—considering that it was instituted nearly nineteen hun- dred years ago —that we have discov- ered a new fact when we state that Christmas comes on the 2sth of December. But, intending to celebrate the day, we owe this seemingly needless announcement to our readers as a sort of explanation. ‘There has been such a decided regularity in the arrival of Christmas for so many yeas past, that no fears are even now entertained of any ac- cident on any railroad that will delay its arrival. Christmas was invented for the encourage- ment of religious thought and the sale of holi- day presents. =~ We don’t want to be unfair to religious thought, but, as a matter of fact, the holiday presents a are great stimulant. Who first invented holiday presents history does not show. This is not as it should be. There are monuments erected every day to men far less worthy of recognition. Would it not be well to pause amid the revel- ty of Christmas festivities,and think how many of the merrymakers about us are rejoicing over the event that causes the celebration of the day, and how many over the gay and glorious enjoyment—the ecstatic circus, as it were— that they are having, outside of all considera- tions of the primal cause? Not that we have the slightest 1ight to object to enjoyment, to whatever source it may be traced, but we wish to put in a good word for Christmas beyond its better-known claims to re- spect. The human heart yearns for an occasional “ give-away;” and it is as well that its yearning should be gratified once a year. The season has now arrived when the ave- rage young man will button his ulster closely about him, and with lugubrious mien walk through the brilliant, bustling street, and make desperate but vain arithmetical attempts to subtract five from two and borrow one. ‘The truth will gradually dawn upon him then that Christmas is a luxury, and that it oughtn’t to be encouraged. The young man is not the only one who forms this idea every year. But youth feels the truth more keenly than age. Youth has not been hardened by experience. Some men, however, are born experienced; which is where we (this is a full-blown editorial “«we") come in. Santa Claus is a gentleman with a gray beard, who drives reindeers and is not afraid of the climate. We don’t want to say anything in deprecia- tion of the old gentleman, but if in his gene- rosity he should see fit to fling his bounty to a few poor people, he would be entitled to a much better notice. ‘The rich one’s don’t need him. It is his habit, we belieye, to cram good things into stockings. We are not particular about the stockings. He can have our boots, if he'll do the filling. But though we are not the recipients of many thousand Christmas favors annually, we are none the less charitably disposed to our neigh- bors. If we could—these are a list of CHRISTMAS PRESENTS we should give: To Presipent Haves—A Bust of Senator Conkling. To Senator ConxLinG—A bound Volume of the New York Zimes, To Wm. H. Vanpersitt—A few dollars— just for luck. ‘ To Geo. F, TRain—A Pea-nut. To Cuas. A. Dana— Ovid's Art of Love. To THE “ Wortp ”—An Obelisk. To THe Stone MaN—An Ulster. To AntHoNny Comstock—The Venus Ana- dyomene. ' To Commissioner ErHarpt—A barrel of Beer. : To Ex-PRESIDENT BROADWELL—A reserved seat in the Black Maria. To H. W. Beecuer—Some True Outward- ness. To the Suttan or Turkey—A Russian Bath. To W. M. Evarts.—Roget’s Thesaurus. ‘To Presipent Mac Manon —A copy of Puck. To Tupper Houtanp - A full set of his own works, ‘To Oakey Hatt—A Rest. To the Czar or Russta—No replevin-er of- Plevna. To Dion Boucicautt—A Speller and De- finer. To Srantey Matruews—A friend on the Press. To Jutta Moore—Swinburne’s Poems. ‘To THE NationaL Trust Co.—A little Trust. To Roosevet—Better luck next time. To Mrs. GENERAL SHERMAN—A Mabel Waltz. To Sittinc Butt—A standing engagement. To Genera Howarp—Introduction to a live Indian. To Minister WeLsi —A copy of “II Bacio.” ESSENTIAL OIL OF CONGRESS. SENATE. | WASHINGTON, Tuesday, Dec. 11th. Senator Conk inc distinguished himself by presenting petitions. There were petitions from men and women who wish to have a hand in ballot-box-stuffing. Petitions urging non-tinker- ing with our gloriously perfect tariff. Petitions by Praise-God Barebones water-drinkers asking that the liquor traffic be investigated micros- copically and anatomically by a commission. The everlasting Silver question again occu- pied the attention of the Senate. Puck would here remark that Senators might save themselves the trouble of talking for or against it, for Hayes will veto anything which savors of repudiation. WEDNESDAY. SeNnatoR ConKLinG scored a victory in the matter of non-confiimation of New York Cus- tom House appointments. He said if Collectors of Ports and Naval Officers didn’t put in their pockets all the duties that were paid on the various articles of merchandise, he couldn’t see why their heads should be amputated. Senator Bavarp. thought of all the rotten institutions in the country the New York Cus- tom House would take the first premium. New brooms would sweep clean, so let them invest in these articles by all means. Senator Gorpon said, the King, he meant the President, could do no wrong. Cornell hadn't obeyed Hayes’s order, therefore Cornell must ‘git.’ Senator Epmunps wanted to be convinced that the personnel of the New York Custom House really could be improved on in this side of the Millenium. It was by a vote of 25 to 31 decided that it could not. Puckerings. PLAINTIVE APPEAL OF THE BARKEEPER.—Beer with me yet a little ! Tue Lay or rHe Beer-KeEc. Come into the back-yard, George, I am sitting here alone, And the seidel is wafted gaily around, And the Excise Board be blown. Is there no society in existence for the pre- vention of cruelty to vegetables and vegetable productions? If not, why doesn’t Bergh orga- nize something of the kind? ‘The treatment to which the anise-seed bag is subjected by the Queen’s County hunt, is simply barbarous. He lies across the teacher's knee, his broadest end on top, And the teacher buckles down to work like a Cossack of the Don; When the voice of the afflicted arises shrilly: “Stop! It isn’t fair: I haven’t got my winter trousers on!” . Now the citizen who ownsa tenement-house, into which not a breath of pure air or a box of laundry-soap has gone during the past year, subscribes fifty dollars to a turkey dinner for the children of the Five Points Mission, and smiles benignantly upon the world, and regards himself as a shining light unto the ‘people. In these days, when you see a man standing at a street corner and wiping his mouth, you may not be justified in asserting that he has been drinking beer; but you have a right to infer that he has gone in a side-door and then by way of a tenement-house entry, through a cellar, and up a step-ladder to a retired back yard in the centre of the block. Tuis is the week when the cat kindly re- frains from breaking any crockery; when the most supercilious domestic will carry a hod of coal up to the fifth story without amurmur; when Millicent Aurelia’s pinafore is guiltless of candy- smirches and when Johnny refrains from tear- ing his trousers, and brings homeaclean report book from school. Next week will be different in style. ‘Tuov art not utterly gone from us, O beloved schooner, vessel dear unto our hearts, although for a time thou hidest thy face from the sight of man. Who soseeketh thee shall find thee, and who so knocketh at the side-door, and beareth the impress of honesty upon his’ face, nor looketh like a spy of the Oliver Coter crowd, it shall be opened unto him. O Excise Board! where is thy victory? O Law-and- Order-League, that was to have got us in a | Sling, where is thy sling?