[Illustration: PUNCH VOL CIX] LONDON: PUBLISHED AT THE OFFICE, 85, FLEET STREET, AND SOLD BY ALL BOOKSELLERS. 1895. LONDON: BRADBURY, AGNEW, & CO. LD., PRINTERS, WHITEFRIARS. * * * * * PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI. VOL. 109. DECEMBER 28, 1895. [Illustration: PREFACE] A COLLOQUY IN CLOUDLAND. SCENE--_Cloudland, nigh to midnight of the last day of the Old Year. The Incomparable Sage of Fleet Street and "La Mancha's Matchless Knight" mounted on their respective wooden horses._ _Mr. Punch_ (_spurring the Spotted One_). Yoicks! Tallyho!! Hark forward!!! Something like space-consuming speed this, eh, my dear Don? Who talks now of a Horseless Age? _Don Quixote_ (_turning the peg of Malambruno's magic steed_). Only your scientific and sensational journals, who, dryasdust dogs! are, after all, endless leagues behind Merlin the Enchanter, and the magic-aided heroes of old romance. _Mr. Punch._ Kim up, my timber-built timber-topper, and spotted space-devourer! As though the much-talked of motor-carriage, auto-cycle, or petroleum-propelled tram-car of these mouthing days of modernity might compare with the Trifaldi's steed, my spotted Pegasus, or even the peripatetic carpet of Persian story! Speed you well, valorous knight! _Don Quixote._ Heaven guide thee, undaunted Sage! Hah! How you fly aloft! How you cut the air more swiftly than an arrow!! How you mount, and soar, and astonish the world below!!! _Mr. Punch._ Haha! Ours is no imaginary, bellows-blown flight, as was yours, worthy knight, when seated with SANCHO on the wooden crupper of Clavileno, pressed aforetime by the valourous PETER of Provence, and the fair MAGALONA! _Don Quixote._ Nay, indeed, Sir Knight of the Spotted Bucephalus--for thou art no chivalry-scorning TRIFALDI--we are not now blindfolded, and _thy_ Pegasus, _thy_ Brilladoro, _thy_ Bayarte, _thy_ Frontino, _thy_ Clavileno el Aligero--or Wooden-Peg the Winged--might give a lead even to my renowned Rosinante! _Mr. Punch._ Blindfolded? Nay, dear knight, I am the Dazzling Illuminator, not the Bewildering Blinder! _Don Quixote._ I plainly perceive that thou art a Progressive. _Mr. Punch._ I am a Progressive Moderate and a Moderate Progressive. Badge me not therefore in any less comprehensive fashion, O Knight of the Rueful Countenance. _Don Quixote._ I presume, Sir Sage, that those same Progressives, however, who claim to initiate all the forthright movement of the Age, did originate and invent the motor-carriages, auto-cycles, and other the horseless locomotive vehicles of which we spake but now? _Mr. Punch._ Who better than yourself should know, my dear Don, that all are not Progressives who make a stir about Progress? Like the circumgyrators in the game of "Giant's Stride," many of them ramp round in a circle, and "get no forrader." _I_ am the only true and trustworthy Progressive, and my auto-motor cuts _all_ records!