This novel application of mechanism, to the purposes of periodical
publications, is the invention of an ingenious _littérateur_. The
hoppers above being fed with subject of all sorts, from "Criminal
Trials" to "Joe Millers," the handle is turned, and the fountain-pens
immediately begin to write articles upon everything. The idea has been
taken from the _Eureka_, but very much elaborated. The demand for
"Virtuous Indignation" is very great just now; hence all blue-eyed,
shoeless infants, taken up for stealing, street-vagabonds, and rascally
poachers (whose punishment it is the fashion to call "the wrongs of the
poor man"), will fetch good prices, by applying to publishers generally.
TUBAL CAIN.
BY CHARLES MACKAY.
[_To be sung by Mr. H. Russell._]
Old Tubal Cain was a cunning file,
In the days when men were green;
But not till night, when the gas burnt bright,
Was he ever to be seen.
And he fashioned reports for the daily press,
Of sudden deaths and fire;
But a penny a line by his industry
Was all he could acquire.
And he sang, "Hurrah! for my handiwork
Hurrah! for the street called Bow;
Hurrah! for the tin that its office brings,
When pockets run rather low!"
But a sudden thought came into his head,
As he gazed on the _Evening Sun_;
And he thought, as its lists of new lines he read,
That a great deal might be done.
He saw that men whom nobody knew
Soon swallowed up every share;
And he said to himself, "I will do so too,
And date my note 'Eaton Square!'"
And he sang, "Hurrah! for my handiwork;
As he posted it then and there;
Not for wealth and trade were the new lines made,"
And he _stagged_ the first railway share!
And for many a night did Tubal Cain write,
In the tap of the "Cheshire Cheese;"
And the penny stamp, with paste still damp,
Procured him his scrip with ease.
And he rose at last, with a cheerful face,
To seek his own house and grounds;
For he very soon made, by his capital trade,
Above twenty thousand pounds!
And he sang, "Alas! how I ever could think
Of my newspaper work to brag;
The only use of a pen and ink
Is to bring all the scrip to the STAG!"
FIRST ANNUAL REPORT OF THE ASTLEY'S
ASSOCIATION
FOR THE DIFFUSION OF GENERAL INFORMATION.
This meeting, first established by Professor Widdicombe, the father of
the Antiquarian Society, promises to become a most important
institution. Through the urbanity of the Professor, who has spent a very
long life—in fact, so long as to be almost fabulous—in collecting
information on various points not apparently properly understood, we
have been favoured with the "Report;" and from it we propose to make
various extracts, premising, that "The Bride of the Nile," "The Conquest
of Amoy," "The Battle of Hastings," "The ditto of Waterloo," with other
dramas, have furnished the authorities.