+My Dear Mr. Punch+,
In my Autobiography, which I am glad and proud to say, has met with your
cordial approbation, I have recorded how the late lamented Bishop, Dr.
+Sumner+, said to me, "I have drunk a bottle of port wine every day
since I was a boy." Well, his son, the Archdeacon, is annoyed at this
statement. Now, my memory is a very good one, and if I am wrong in one
point so circumstantially narrated, why not in several, why not in all?
If the Bishop did not say this, to me, _who did_? Somebody said it, that
I will swear. Who said it? If my memory fails me, is it not also likely
that the Bishop's memory was not particularly good, and consequently,
that he was mistaken in thinking that he had drunk a bottle a day since
his boyhood? I have little doubt that the Bishop only imagined it, and
perhaps he was joking. Perhaps he was playing on the words "bishop" and
"port." "Bishop" was a hot drink, I fancy, made with port wine. I have
no hesitation in comforting his Archidiaconal offspring by assuring him
that, to the best of my knowledge and belief, his father, the Bishop,
did not drink a bottle of port every day since his boyhood. He was a
very fine old clergyman--I forget whether he was exactly portly or not,
or whether he resided in Portman Square,--and I should say that
first-rate port, such as the _elixir vitae_ that made a hale centenarian
of Sir +Moses Montefiore+, taken frequently, would have tended to make
him the genial prelate he was. Had he only gone into port once, that
would not have sufficed to have produced such a Bishop, for "One swallow
does not make a +Sumner+."
Yours ever,
+W(ithdraw) P(ort) Frith+.
P.S.--The Archdeacon is satisfied, and if he will only come round to see
me and bring a bottle of the port the Bishop didn't drink, why, on my
word as an artist, _I'll draw the cork_.
* * * * *
"_What shall he have who kills the Deer_?" Why, something to eat, of
course. At least this was, among others, the notion of the poor starving
Cottars. And they have now given up venison-eating because the food is
deer.
* * *
+Two French Presidents Rolled Into One.+--M. +Grevy+, on being told that
he must resign, wept copiously. This showed a want of resignation.
Curious sight, +Grevy+ and Tears!
* * *
Sir +Charles Warren+ has been presented with the freedom of the
Leathersellers' Guild. Capital motto for Policemen in a mob, "Nothing
like leather! Leather away!"
* * * * *