Puck — December 24, 1879 — page 3: what you’re looking at

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

PUCK, 681 A DISILLUSIONED CHRISTMAS. He does not strew with fancy’s flowers The path their youthful feet must tread; He shows them how the speeding hours Are to be caught before they ’re sped. He calls himself a ‘business man," Honest, and practical and plain, And plain and practical ’s the plan Now germinating in his brain. ~\_ A simple-souled iconoclast, His firm resolve is to suppress That foolish fiction of the past, T is the Smith, who homeward wends, A weary way through deep snow and drifts; His sturdy backbone weary bends Beneath his load of Christmas gifts. ‘The Smith he is a parent kind, But somewhat of the Roman mould: He likes to train the youthful mind As if the youthful mind were old. Of Santa Claus’s strange largesse. “Why should I let a hollow myth Steal from my small yet healthy brood The credit that belongs to Smith And Smith's own claim to gratitude?” * * 'Tis done! Old Santa Claus—Jack Frost— All fairy fibs he calm destroys:— * 2 Then sees his children weep the lost Dear Dead Delusion o'er their toys. THE GRANT BOOM. ws pay mt ATELY has been added to our Ameri- [5 can political vocabulary the word S= Boom,” which sprang up nobody knows where,and means nobody knows exactly what, The term may have arisen from the system of booming great rafts of logs on our rivers; or the term may refer to the boom which is spead out from the mast to extend the canvas to the favoring breeze. Our opinion is that it is the “boom” of the cannon which has given rise to this phrase. ; Now there be booms and booms. The boys try cannon booms on the 4th of July; so does the militiaman’s brass field-piece; so did Far- ragut’s fleet as it steamed past the batteries to New Orleans. But there is a vast difference between these booms, and it seems to us that if our idea of what the Grant boom means is correct, the affair will end in disaster. General Grant has received some notably enthusiastic receptions since his return to Amer- ica, but those who have watched the inner wheels of the machinery will have noticed that he was received nof as a Republican politician but as a distinguished citizen returned home. Democrats were invited to meet him; Confede- rate soldiers were requested to march before him; politicians of all grades were solicited to join in and swell the great welcome to the only ¥ ex-President who had gone round the world. Wherefor Grant is being féted across the conti- nent. The politics has been left out of this tri- umphal journey, and it has been very well done. The bunting, the music, the school- children, the popping of champagne corks, even the speeches have been creditable to the managers. But if politics had been let run into the affair, a much poorer show would have been the result, and that’s what’s the matter with the boom. There is a man in a circus who gets rammed down into a wooden cannon and then is shot skyward into a netting. But sometimes the cannon goes off at the vent, while the attend- ants pull the man out ignominiously at the muzzle. We are very much afraid that if these boom- ing Grant managers—the Babcocks, Shepherds, Robesons, and all that crowd of tricksters and public plunderers—should load up the Grant Columbiad which is to fire him willy-nilly into the White House, that the charge of jobs, sub- sidies, trickery, legislation, would blow the breech into fragments about them, and leave Mr. Grant stuck in the nozzle of the muzzle, unable either to get in or out. Instead of exhibiting himself to his fellow- countrymen in this ridiculous position, we ad- vise him to go down and dig a ship canal through the Nicaraguan swamps. FITZNOODLE IN AMERICA. 7 No. CXIV. CHRISTMAS AND PRESENTS, Ya.as, I believe theend of the ye-ah and Chrwistmas have come wound again. ‘They al- Yf ways do about this perwiod. This Chrwistmas is observed in a we- markably pwonounced mannah he-ah, especially as is everwything Amerwican, being ovahdone in the mattah of pwesents, everwy individual being expected to make everwy othah indivi- dual of his acquaintance a pwesent. This would be all verwy well if the gifts were made as fwee-will offerwings to those whom one wespects and esteems; but the wegulah pwac- tice seems to be to give indis-wiminately, with a view to getting an equivalent, or even some- thing bettah, in weturn, Aw I do not wefer to the twifles which are usually given to childwen on this occasion— that is pwobably all corwect and pwopah—but to the aw intahchange of cominodities among gwown-up people. Miss Marguerwite politely wequested me the othah morning to accompany her on a shop- ping expedition. I said I would go, and in the course of our perwegwinations we visited a pwo- digious numbah of shops and a varwiety of things were purchased—indeed aw, enough to stock a bazaar of immoderwate dimensions, Miss Marguerwite dwew fwom her pocket a list of names, with memorwanda against each patwonymic, and commenced operwations. We first entahed a furwiah’s establishment, and Miss Marguerwite bought something made of aseal-skin. I’m wathah inclined to think it was a sort of ovahcoat faw winter, or perwhaps a sacque. I haven’t the wemotest ide-ah of the pwice of these things, but suppose the arwangement couldn’t have cost less than thrwee or four dol- lahs, which in Bwitish money would amount to fifteen or sixteen shillings. Then she bought a Marwabout feathah, which, I venture to say, must have cost a ten- pound note in Amerwican curwency, I made a mental memorwandum of some of her othah purchases, with the pwobable cost, and it is something like the following aw; One child's cwadle A diamond bwooch . ... Severwal books... . wees A bwacelet of some descwiption of metal... A gweat assortment of articles of fancy dwaperwy...... 6 seeeseees200 0 Extwaordinarwy Bwackets and odd decor- wations faw a numbah of fwiends’ wooms. 1 0 0 ‘An embwoidered handkercbief........,... 36 It is too much twouble to weckon up the dif- ferwent items, but they must in the aggwegate amount to severwal hundwed pounds, Now I weally think this expenditure widicu- lously extwavagant. We are not so absurd at home, yer know, at Chrwistmas. We give Chrwistmas-boxes to childwen and servants, but what the d-d-dickens does a man want with such things wegularly everwy ye-ah ? I look upon the custom as a wemnant of that aw barbarwic pomp which the pwogwess of civ- ilization has not yet succeeded in erwadicating fwom the Amerwican mind aw.” P. S. Miss Marguerwite has pwesented me with an embwoidered cigarwette-case, which she made for me herself. Wemarkably kyind! Perwhaps there is, aftah all, something in this Chrwistmas gift business aw. comicbooks.com