(_By way of Introduction_)
[Illustration: Ragged Irishman standing]
No PUNCH artist has done more with Irish humour than Charles Keene.
Well over a third of the PUNCH drawings on this subject are from his
pencil. Most of the PUNCH artists have made good use of it, Phil May
and Mr. Raven-Hill in particular.
Some of MR. PUNCH'S jokes against the Fenians, Home Rule, and Irish
disloyalty have a bitterness that is quite unusual with him, but none
of these are included in our pages, and he has at other times handled
the same topics with his customary geniality and good-humoured satire.
He makes the most of the Irishman's traditional weakness for "##bulls"
whisky, fighting, and living with his pigs, but he gets an immense
amount of variety out of these themes, and does not neglect to touch
upon other typically Irish characteristics. If you have examples of the
Irishman's blunderings, you have examples also of his ready wit and his
amazing talent for blarney.
We have thus in the present volume a delightful collection of Irish
wit and high spirits. The happy-go-lucky characteristic of Pat is
especially prominent in many of the jokes, and interpreting MR. PUNCH'S
attitude towards the Irishman as one of admiration for his many
excellent qualities, instead of regarding him as the "but" for English
jokes, too often the notion of comic writers, the editor has sought to
represent MR. PUNCH as the friend of Pat, sometimes his critic, but
always his good humoured well-wisher, who laughs at him now and then,
but as often with him.
[Illustration: Mr Punch striding purposefully]