Mr. Punch with the Children by J. A. Hammerton (ready player one ebook .txt) 📕

forbidden fruit?

Small Scholar ("like a shot"). Please, sir, th'worn't no commandments then, sir!

    [Questioner sits corrected.

[Pg 176] AT A CHILDREN'S PARTY During Tea

Yes, isn't it a pretty sight.... Oh, they're much too busy to talk at present.... Well, if you would take this cup of tea to my little girl, dear Mr. Muffett, it would be so——Yes, in the white frock.... Pray don't apologise—some tea upsets so easily, doesn't it?... Oh! I don't suppose it will show, really, and if it does.... Please, will everybody keep quite quiet for a minute or two; I haven't said my grace.... Don't you think it's unfair of nurse? She's handed me bread-and-butter twice running!... I mustn't eat sponge-cake, thank you. Bath buns are better for me than anything.... I was so ill after Christmas. They took my temperament with the barometer, and it was two hundred and six!... Oh! that's nothing. When I was ill, the doctor said mine was perfectly Norman!... Well, you might lower that candleshade a very little, perhaps,[Pg 178] Mr. Muffett.... Ah! don't blow it out.... Throw it into the fire, quick!... It doesn't matter in the least. No; I wouldn't trouble about the other shades, thanks.... Mother, will you read me the text out of my cracker?... But if you're going to be a soldier, you oughtn't to shut your eyes when you pull a cracker.... Oh! when I'm a soldier, I needn't go to parties.

During a Performance of Punch and Judy

A Thoughtful Child. What a dreadful thing it would be to have a papa like Punch!

A Puzzled Child. Mother, why is the man at the side so polite to Punch? He calls him "Sir"—is Punch really a gentleman?

A Good Little Girl. I do wish they would leave all the fighting out; it must set such a bad example to children.

An Appreciative Boy. Oh! I say, did you hear what the clown said then? He said something had frightened all the hair off his head except that little tuft at the top, and it turned that sky-blue!

    [He goes into fits of laughter.

[Pg 180]

A Matter-of-fact Boy. Yes, I heard—but I don't believe it could.

The Child of the House. I am so glad Tip is shut up downstairs, because I'm afraid, if he'd been up here and seen Toby act, he'd have wanted to run away and go on the stage himself, and I don't think he's the sort of dog who would ever be a success, you know!

During the Dancing

Jack. I say, Mabel, you've got to dance the "Washington Post" with me.

Mabel. I can't. I've promised Teddy Thistledown.

Jack. Oh! that's all right. I swapped with him for a Nicaragua stamp.

Mabel (touched). But aren't they rare? Didn't you want it yourself?

Jack. Oh! I don't collect, you know.

George (to Ethel). They've given us the whole of "Ivanhoe" to mug up for a holiday task. Isn't it a beastly shame?

Ethel. But don't you like Scott?

[Pg 182]

George. Oh! I don't mind Scott so much. It's having to grind in the holidays that I bar.

Hester (to Roland). Shall you go to the pantomime this year?

Roland. I don't think so. I'm going to lectures at the Royal Institution instead.

Hester. That isn't as jolly as the pantomime, is it?

Roland (impartially). Not while it's going on, but a lot jollier after it's over.

Mr. Poffley (a middle-aged bachelor, who "likes to make himself useful at parties," and is good-naturedly waltzing with little Miss Chillington). Have you—er—been to many parties?

Miss Chillington (a child of the world). About the usual amount. There's generally a good deal going on just now, isn't there?

Mr. Poffley. A—I suppose so. I go out so little now that I've almost forgotten how to dance.

Miss Chillington. Then you did know once!

Mr. Poffley (completely demoralised). I—er—you would rather stop?

[Pg 184]

Miss Chillington. Oh! I don't mind going on, if it amuses you.

[Mr. Poffley feels that "children are not so grateful as they used to be for being noticed," and that it is almost time he gave up going to juvenile parties.

After Supper

The Hostess (returning to the drawing-room to find the centre of the floor occupied by a struggling heap of small boys, surrounded by admiring but mystified sisters). Oh! dear me, what are they doing? I'm so afraid my two boys are being too rough, Mrs. Hornblower.

Mrs. Hornblower (one of a row of complacent matrons). Oh! not at all, dear Mrs. Honeybun, they're having such fun. Your Edwin and Arthur are only trying how many boys they can pile on the top of my Tommy.

Mrs. Honeybun. Is that Tommy underneath? Are you sure he's not getting hurt?

Mrs. Horn. Oh! he thoroughly enjoys a romp. [Pg 186] He's made himself perfectly hoarse with laughing. Just listen to him!

Mrs. Honey. What a sturdy little fellow he is! And always in such high spirits!

Mrs. Horn (confidentially). He hasn't seemed quite the thing for the last day or two, and I was doubting whether it wouldn't be better to keep him at home to-night, but he begged so hard that I really had to give way.

Mrs. Honey. So glad you did! It doesn't seem to have done him any harm.

Mrs. Horn. Quite the contrary. And indeed, he couldn't help being the better for it; you understand so thoroughly how to make children happy, dear Mrs. Honeybun.

Mrs. Honey. It's delightful of you to say so; I try my best, but one can't always——Last year we had a conjurer, and it was only when he'd begun that we found out he was helplessly intoxicated.

Mrs. Horn. How disagreeable for you! But this time everything has been quite perfect![Pg 188]

Mrs. Honey. Well, I really think there has been no——Good gracious! I'm sure somebody is being suffocated! Did you hear that?

[From the core of the heap proceeds a sound at which every mother's heart quakes—a smothered cough ending in a long-drawn and ominous "oo-ook.'

Mrs. Horn. Depend upon it, that's whooping-cough! Tommy, come here this minute. (Tommy emerges, crimson and crowing lustily; the mothers collect their offspring in dismay). Oh! Tommy, Tommy, don't tell me it's you! It—it can't be that, dear Mrs. Honeybun; he's been nowhere where he could possibly——You naughty boy, you know you are only pretending. Don't let me hear that horrid noise again.

Tommy (injured). But, mummy, really I wasn't——

[He justifies himself by producing a series of whoops with an unmistakably genuine ring.

Mrs. Horn. I think it's only a rather severe attack of hiccoughs, dear Mrs. Honeybun; but[Pg 190] still, perhaps—just to be on the safe side—I'd better——

[She departs in confusion, the crowd on the stairs dividing like Red Sea waves as Tommy proclaims his approach.

Mrs. Honey (after the last guest has gone). I knew something would happen! I must say it was most inconsiderate of Mrs. Hornblower to bring that wretched little Tommy out and break up the party like this—it's not as if we were really intimate! Still, it was ridiculous of everybody else to hurry off too, as if whooping-cough was anything to be so mortally afraid of! I wasn't in the least myself, as they might have seen. But perhaps it is just as well that Edwin and Arthur had it last winter.

Ready Answer.—Uncle. Now, how did the mother of Moses hide him?

Niece. With a stick, uncle.

[Pg 177]