“Harry, I cannot think,” says Dick,
“What makes my _ancles_ grow so thick:”
“You do not recollect,” says Harry,
“How great _a calf_ they have to carry.”
* * * * *
“OLD WESTMINSTER QUIBBLES.”
_Toes._
A fellow did desire
To warm at a fire
His toes, before he went home;
But the man said “No,
If you put fire and _toe_
Together, you will burn the room.”
_B. C._
One did ask, why B
Was put before C,
And did much desire to know--
Why a man must _be_,
Before he can _see_,
And I think I have hit on it now.
_The Red Nose._
A Man did surmise,
That another man’s eyes
Were both of a different frame;
For if they had been _matches_,
Then, alas! poor wretches,
His nose would a set ’em in a flame.
* * * * *
“NEW WESTMINSTER QUIBBLES.”
_The Soldier._
“There is one soldier less,”
Exclaimed sister Bess,
As a funeral passed by the door;
Then said Mr. Brown,
“I’ll bet you a crown,
I’ll prove it is one soldier _mort_.”
_Scilicet._
Why every silly cit
Has pretensions to wit,
You may learn if you listen to my ditty:
The word _scilicet_
In law means _to wit_,
So citizens, by law, must be _witty_.
Vol. II.--52.
[Illustration: ~Irish Pipes.~]
A young friend brings me from Ireland a couple of pipes, in common use
among the labouring people in Dublin and Clonmel. Their shape and
materials being wholly different from any in England, they are
represented in the above engraving, which shows their exact size. The
bowl part, formed of iron, like the socket of a candlestick, is inserted
in a piece of mahogany carved, as here shown, in the shape of a violin,
or a pair of bellows, or other whimsical form; and the mahogany is
securely bound and ornamented with brass wire: to a small brass chain is
attached a tin cover to the bowl. The tube is of dogwood, such as
butchers’ skewers are made of, or of a similar hard wood; and, being
movable, may be taken out for accommodation to the pocket, or renewal at
pleasure. These pipes cost sixpence each.
The _dudeen_, or short pipe, the “little tube of magic power,” wherewith
the Irish labourer amuses himself in England, is thus mentioned in a
note on the “Fairy Legends and Traditions of the South of Ireland,” by
Mr. Crofton Croker:--“_Dudeen_ signifies a little stump of a pipe. Small
tobacco-pipes, of an ancient form, are frequently found in Ireland on
digging or ploughing up the ground, particularly in the vicinity of
those circular intrenchments, called Danish forts, which were more
probably the villages or settlements of the native Irish. These pipes
are believed by the peasantry to belong to the Cluricaunes, and when
discovered are broken, or otherwise treated with indignity, as a kind of
retort for the tricks which their supposed owners had played off.” Mr.
Croker subjoins a sketch of one of these pipes, and adds, that “In the
Anthologia Hibernica, vol i. p. 352, (Dublin, 1793,) there is a print of
one, which was found at Brannockstown, county Kildare, sticking between
the teeth of a human skull; and it is accompanied by a paper, which, on
the authority of Herodotus, (lib. i. sec. 36,) Strabo, (lib. vii. 296,)
Pomponius Mela, (2,) and Solinus, (c. 15,) goes to prove that the
northern nations of Europe were acquainted with tobacco, or an herb of
similar properties, and that they smoked it through small tubes--of
course, long before the existence of America was known.”
* * * * *
~Garrick Plays.~
No. XLV.