Puppets at Large: Scenes and Subjects from Mr Punch's ShowAnstey, F.
General
Puppets at Large: Scenes and Subjects from Mr Punch's Show
Anstey, F.
English wit and humor
No idea what "_blode-foots_" may be, but from the relish in BOSCH'S
tone, evidently something very unpleasant, so don't press him for
explanations. We go upstairs, and see some dark and very mouldy
dungeons, which BOSCH is very anxious that I should enter. Make him go
in _first_, for the surroundings seem to have excited his sense of the
humorous to such a degree, that he might be unable to resist locking me
in, and leaving me, if I gave him a chance.
Outside at last, thank goodness! The Groote Kerk, according to BOSCH,
"is not vort de see," so we don't see it. SANDFORD has a sneaking
impression that I ought to go in, but MERTON glad to be let off. We go
to see the pictures at the Mauritshuis instead. BOSCH exchanges
greetings with the attendants in Dutch. "Got _another_ of 'em in tow,
you see--and collar-work, _I_ can tell you!" would be a free
translation, I suspect, of his remarks. Must say that, in a
Picture-gallery, BOSCH is a superfluous luxury. He _does_ take my
ignorance just a trifle too much for granted. He _might_ give me credit
for knowing the story of Adam and Eve, at all events! "De Sairpan gif
Eva de opple, an' Eva gif him to Adam," BOSCH carefully informs me,
before a "_Paradise_," by Rubens and Brueghel.
This rouses my MERTON half to inquire what Adam did with it.
"Oh, _he_ ead him too!" says BOSCH in perfect good faith.
I do wish, too, he wouldn't lead me up to Paul Potter's "_Bull_," and
ask me enthusiastically if it isn't "real meat." I shouldn't mind it so
much if there were not several English people about, without
couriers--but there _are_. My only revenge is (as MERTON) to carefully
pick out the unsigned canvases and ask BOSCH who painted them; whereupon
BOSCH endeavours furtively to make out the label on the frames, and then
informs me in desperation, "it vas '_School_,'--yass, _he_ baint him!"
BOSCH kindly explains the subject of every picture in detail. He tells
me a Droochsloot represents a "balsham pedder." I suppose I look
bewildered, for he adds--"oppen air tance mit a village." "Hier dey vas
haf a tispute; dis man say de ham vas more value as de cheese--dere is
de cheese, and dere is de ham." "Hier is an old man dot marry a yong
vife, and two tevils com in, and de old man he ron avay." "Hier he dress
him in voman, and de vife is vrighten." "Hier is Jan Steen himself as a
medicine, and he veel de yong voman's polse, and say dere is nodings de
madder, and the modder ask him to trink a glass of vine." "Hier is de
beach at Skavening--now dey puild houses on de dunes--bot de beach is
schdill dere."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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