straint, than in our republic, we cannot say. Were he on this side of the Atlantic, he might possibly find occasion to be less partial in the use of his reproving fun. Young misses seem to be growing scarce, and young ladies becoming alarmingly numerous. The early date at which the cry comes for long skirts, parties, balls, and late hours, for lace, jewelry, and gold watches, threatens to rob our homes of one of their sweetest charms,—the bright presence of joyous, gentle, and modest lasses, willing to be happy children for as many years as their mothers were, on their way to maidenhood and womanhood.
Punch is a reformer,—and of the right type, too; not destructive, declamatory, vituperative; not a monomaniac, snarly, and ill-natured,—as if zeal in riding a favorite hobby excused exclusiveness of soul and any amount of bad temper. He would not demolish the social system and build on its ruins a new one; being clearly of the opinion that the growths of ages and the doings of six thousands of years are to be respected,—that progress means improvement upon the present, rather than overthrow of the entire past. Calm, hopeful, cheerful, and patient, he is at the same time bold and uncompromising, and a bit radical into the bargain. In his own delicious way, he has been no mean advocate of liberal principles and measures. He has argued for the repeal of the corn and the modification of the game laws, the softening of the cruelties of the criminal code, and the fair administration of law for all orders and conditions of men and women. He has had no respect for ermine, lawn, or epaulets, in his assaults upon the monopolies and sinecures of Church and State, circumlocution offices, nepotism, patronage, purchase, and routine, in army or navy. He wants the established religion to be religious, not a cover for aristocratic preferments and dog-in-the-manger laziness,—and government administered for the whole people, and not merely dealing out treasury-pap and fat offices for the pensioned few. Punch is loyal, sings lustily, "God Save the Queen," and stands by the Constitution. He is a true-born Englishman, and patriotic to the backbone; but none are too high in place or name for his merciless ridicule and daring wit, if they countenance oppressive abuses. It is a tall feather in his fool's-cap, that his fantastic person is a dread to evil-doers on thrones, in cabinets, and red-tape offices. Crowned tyrants, bold usurpers, and proud statesmen are sensitive, like other mortals, to ridicule, and know very well how much easier it is to cannonade rebellious insurgents than to put down the general laugh, and that the point of a joke cannot be turned by the point of the bayonet. "Punch" was seized in Paris on account of the caricature of the "Sphinx," but after twenty-four hours' consideration the order of confiscation was rescinded, and the irreverent publication now lies upon the tables of the reading-rooms. So, iron power is not beyond the reach of the shafts of wit; once make it ridiculous, and it may continue to lie dreaded, but will cease to be respected.
Limits permitting, it would be pleasant to refer at length to various other marked graces of Punch,—such, for example, as his care for true Art, by exposing to merited contempt the abortions of statuary, painting, and architecture that come under his accurate eye,—his concern for good letters, exhibited in fantastic parodies of affectations, mannerisms, absurdities of plot, and vices of style in modern poets and novelists,—his "nil nisi bonum," and, where there is no "bonum," his silent "nil," of the dead, whom when living he pursued with unrelenting raillery,—his cool, eclectic judgments, freedom from extremes, and other manifestations of clear-headedness and refined sentiment, glimmering and shooting through his rollicking drollery, quick wit, and quiet humor. But we must pass them by, to emphasize a quality that out-tops and outshines them all,—his humanity.
This is Mr. Punch's specialty, generating his purest fun and consecrating his versatile talents to highest ends. Wher-
