[Illustration]
Mr. Punch and Father Time were once again whirling on their way
through boundless space.
They were approaching their next destination, and the dark globe
of the planet had just come into view on the horizon. Rapidly it
increased in size as they neared it, and the seas and continents could
be easily traced.
"Dear me?" exclaimed _Mr. Punch_. "Why, I declare if there is not
something written upon it!" and he put up his binoculars, "Why, it is
nothing more nor less than a big advertisement. Looks like humbug," he
continued. "What's the name of the Planet, eh?"
"Mercury," replied Father TIME, with cheery spirit; "and with that
device they try to catch the eye of a passing Comet."
"Hum--they won't catch me!" observed the Sage, brightly. "I brought
my truth-compeller with me--a little, patent, electrical hypnotic
arrangement, in the shape of this ring"--he showed it as he spoke. "I
have only to turn it on my finger, and it obliges anyone who may be
addressing me instantly to speak the truth."
They suddenly found themselves deposited in the centre of a vast
square, surrounded by large palatial-looking buildings, public
offices, stores, shops, picture-galleries, gigantic blocks of
private residences, in flats five-and-twenty storeys high, and
other architectural developments of the latest constructive crazes,
fashioned, apparently, after the same models, and on similar lines,
to those at present so much in vogue in that now distant planet, the
Earth. There was a profusion of advertisement-boards, these, in many
instances, entirely covering the whole façade of the building with
large-lettered announcements of the nature of the trade or business
conducted within. An eager and excited crowd thronging the pavements,
and hustling each other, without any apparent purpose or aim, was
pushing in all directions.
"I wonder what all this is about," observed _Mr. Punch_; "suppose we
ask a Policeman?"
They noticed a being attired in every respect like the familiar
guardians of the peace on Earth, except that he carried a harmless
and gaily-decked bladder in place of the more serviceable _bâton_, and
beckoned to him. He approached with polite alacrity.
"You want to know what's up, Gents?" he commenced, divining their
purpose instinctively. "It's the Half-Quarterly Meeting of the Solid
Gold Extract of Brick-Dust Company. There's been some little talk
about the dividend not being quite so good as the prospectus led the
shareholders to believe, and as the shares have been mostly taken up
by widows and orphans, some of their friends, you see, are a little
anxious to hear the Chairman's Report. But, you see, it'll be all
right."
At this moment a widow, with blanched cheeks and dishevelled hair,
who had been listening with an anxious and eager gaze to what the
Policeman had been saying, joined the group.
_Mr. Punch_ looked at her with mournful sympathy, and slowly turning
the ring on his finger, addressed the Policeman. "Tell me, my good
man," he said, persuasively, "is that the truth? Is it really all
right?"
"All right?" rejoined the guardian of the peace in amazement, but
apparently unconscious of the purport of his speech, "I should rather
think not. Call it 'all wrong' and then you'll about hit it. Why it's
well known that the patent's all _fudge_. It's the biggest swindle
out. No more in it than in this here bladder. But you'll see; the
whole thing's burst, and you'll know it in a minute."
The words were scarcely out of his mouth when a roar of a thousand
angry voices, followed by a sudden rush from the building of a mad
and raging crowd, obliged _Mr. Punch_, for a moment, to pause. When
the uproar had somewhat subsided, he turned to the Policeman, and
pointed feelingly to the unfortunate widow, who had fallen on to an
apple-stall in a fit of hysterics, and, locking his arm in that of his
aged companion, proceeded to cross the square. "Give us a song, old
'un!" shouted a portion of the mob, who had followed them.
"Certainly. Oblige them!" added _Mr. Punch_, taking a banjo from
one of the crowd and placing it in Father TIME's hands. "Give them a
stanza of the Ballad of Truth."
He turned his ring, and his aged companion struck up the following
ditty:--
"Know ye the land where dwells only mock-turtle,
Where wine that should gladden but makes you fell queer.
Where bayonets bend, where guns burst and hurtle
Their breech in the face of their friends at the rear,
Where lamps labelled 'safety' with just terrors fill you,
Where water supplied you for milk is no theft,
Where pills that should cure, if persisted in, kill you
And the 'Hair Resurrector' takes all you've got left!
Where soap, that should soften your skin, only flays you,
Where a horse proves a screw though got through a friend,
Where the loss of your 'cover' confounds and dismays you,
Though assured by the _Firm_ 'if you hold on t'will mend'?
Know ye, in fine, where by pushing and 'rushing,'
This--and much more, down the public throat crams,
Blatant Advertisement, brazen, unblushing--?
If you do, then you've spotted the _Planet of Shams_."
[Illustration]
Though a few paving-stones were hurled at the aged singer, the
conclusion of his sons was greeted by a general roar of laughter, the
populace apparently recognising the picture of their own chicanery
with amusement and relish.
After that they held on their way for some minutes in silence. They
had now reached the other side, and were confronted by a couple
of respectable-looking gentlemen of an almost clerical aspect, who
appeared to be catering in the public streets in the interests of some
institution. They approached _Mr. Punch_ and Father TIME, and offered
them a prospectus.
"'THE DEAR LITTLE CHILDREN'S HAPPY AND ELEGANT BURIAL INSTITUTION,'"
read _Mr. Punch_, surveying the paper presented to him, and
continuing, "'_A trivial payment of Ninepence a Month will ensure
the youthful Subscriber, or his Representative, a sweet and
elegantly-constructed little Coffin, beautifully frilled, with a
one-black-horse Family Omnibus Hearse, and a tray of Two Handsome
Plumes. N.B.--if preferred, payment of £2 19s. 6d. in cash on
production of Corpse._'"
They showed _Mr. Punch_ and Father TIME up the front steps, and
ushered them into a large hall. It was thronged with a crowd of dirty
and raggedly-dressed people, and partitioned off by a handsome and
massive mahogany counter, beyond which sat a staff of clerks busily
engaged in keeping the books and generally discharging the duties of
the institution.
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"Ha, Mrs. MACSTOGGINS, and are we in your debt again?" asked the Agent
of a beetle-browed woman of a sinister and forbidding expression, who
was thrusting a paper across the counter to the cashier.
"Yes; and I'll trouble you not to keep me waiting, either--seeing that
it's gone three days since the burial."
"Is this woman demanding the insurance money for the burial of her own
child?" asked _Mr. Punch_, sternly. And he turned his ring. "And pray,
Madam," he continued, addressing the beetle-browed woman, "tell me the
truth."
"Certainly," replied the woman, as if in a trance. "First, I insured
my own KATE--then I starved her to death, and took the money. Then
little BILL followed. I let him catch cold in the winter, and gave
him a night or two on the stones, and that finished him. Then came TIM
FLAHERTY, and I managed him with the beetle-poison, and--"
"Come," said _Mr. Punch_, taking Father TIME's arm once more; "let us
get out of this--I can't breathe here."
Scarcely had they quitted the place ere they had to encounter an
appeal for custom, the Applicant being apparently one of the big guns
in the Mercury wine trade, and he was not long in importuning _Mr.
Punch_ just to step inside his office, and sample a delicious Lafitte
of the 1874 vintage.
"Now, try that, Sir," he said, at the same time offering _Mr. Punch_ a
glass of the rich ruby-coloured beverage, "and tell me what you think
of it. We have a small parcel of it still left, and could let you have
it at the remarkably low figure of 112s. the dozen."
"It looks all right," drily replied _Mr. Punch_, "but I can't
think how you can sell it at the price." Then holding up the glass
critically, and turning his ring, continued, "How do you manage it?"
"How do I manage it?" replied the unconscious merchant, laughing
heartily at the apparent joke. "Why, my dear Sir, there's not much
difficulty about that. I just make it myself. Listen to my receipt:--
"Potato spirit--that the 'body' finds;
And then, as for colour,
Be it brighter or duller,
You see I am supplied with several kinds,
And as to flavour, I get that desired,
By adding various poisons as required.
[Illustration]
Ha! ha! Let me send you in a few dozen." He offered _Mr. Punch_ an
elaborate price-list as he concluded his self-condemnatory verse with
an obsequious bow.
"Come," said _Mr. Punch_, once more taking hold of his aged
companion's arm, without condescending to give the cheating tradesman
any reply, "come--let us get out of this. 'Pon my word, I think we've
almost had enough of Mercury!"
"Their morality does seem to have reached rather a low ebb, I must
confess," replied Father TIME.
"Nothing like this on our Earth, anyhow," continued _Mr. Punch_,
with a satisfied sigh of relief. "But come, we'll hear what the whole
people say of themselves. See here's a chance. I believe there's a lot
of them over there singing their National Anthem."
They listened as _Mr. Punch_ spoke. He was right. There was a vast
crowd collected outside one of the principal buildings on the other
side of the square, and they were clearly finishing some popular
anthem in chorus, for, as Father TIME and _Mr. Punch_ paused to
listen, the well-known familiar refrain--
"Never, never, never,
Shall be slaves!"
smote their ear.
"Capital! Capital!" cried _Mr. Punch_, approaching the throng. "We'll
have that again." He turned his ring once more as he spoke, and the
mob responded by shouting their second verse.
"Fool! Mercurius!
Of greed thy sons are slaves;
And they ever, ever, ever--
Shall be knaves!"
"Come," cried _Mr. Punch_, "I think that judgment of themselves out of
their own mouths settles the matter! I have done with them. Come, let
us seek some healthier place. Up we go!"
He seized hold of Old Father TIME as he spoke, and bounded with him
upwards suddenly into space. In another minute they were in search of
a brighter, a better, and a truer world.
[Illustration]
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