The Choice Humorous Works, Ludicrous Adventures, Bons Mots, Puns, and Hoaxes of Theodore HookHook, Theodore Edward
General
The Choice Humorous Works, Ludicrous Adventures, Bons Mots, Puns, and Hoaxes of Theodore Hook
Hook, Theodore Edward
English wit and humor
"In this vast desert [the newspaper] I met with only one thing
which I think worth quoting to you. The article treated of the
speech from the throne, in which were the words 'The Speaker
is commanded to congratulate the people on their universal
prosperity.' 'This,' says the writer, 'is too insolent; openly
to make a jest of the miseries of the people.' It is indeed a
settled point, that truth is never to be expected in a speech
from the throne; and if ever a king were mad enough to wish to
speak the real truth on such an occasion, he must begin his
speech, 'My knaves and dupes,' instead of the wonted exordium,
'My lords and gentlemen.'"
That no such words appeared in any king's speech as those which his
highness is pleased to comment upon, we need not take the trouble
to say; but it is rather strange, since we have already recorded
his highness's view of the real causes of popular distress in this
country, that he should so entirely coincide in the vindictiveness of
the supposed newspaper upon the fictitious expression.
We next find the prince visiting Colonel Hughes's copper-mines; and,
while he is standing by the furnace, he receives an invitation from
the colonel's brother, the major-commandant of the loyal Chester
local militia, to dine with him. His highness not only declines the
invitation, which he was quite at liberty to do, but sneers at the
hospitality which was offered him; and forthwith starts from Lord
Dinorben's copper pots for Holyhead, to embark for Dublin; where,
after a dose of sea-sickness, he arrives in good preservation.
He says--"As I knew not what else to do--(for all the notables
who inhabit the town are in the country)--I visited a number of
show-places; and among the first was the theatre,--a very pretty
house, with a somewhat less rough and obstreperous audience than in
London!" _Eich dyn!_
The descriptions which the "attracting and attracted" prince gives to
"Julia" of his little adventures during his rides upon the horses of
his friends are edifying. In Wales he discovers a sylph weeding in
a field, half naked, but "shy as a roe, and chaste as a vestal." In
Ireland he meets with another interesting female, whose personal and
mental qualities he thus details to his "beloved soul:"--
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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