The Comic Almanack, Volume 2: An Ephemeris in Jest and Earnest, Containing Merry Tales, Humerous Poetry, Quips, and Oddities
David Hume · en
WHAT A GENTLEMAN MAY DO, AND
WHAT HE MAY NOT DO.
He may carry a brace of partridges, but not a leg of mutton.
He may be seen in the omnibus-box at the Opera, but not on the box of an
omnibus.
He may be seen in a stall inside a theatre, but not at a stall outside
one.
He may dust another person's jacket, but mustn't brush his own.
He may kill a man in a duel, but he mustn't eat peas with his knife.
He may thrash a coalheaver, but he mustn't ask twice for soup.
He must pay his debts of honour, but he needn't trouble himself about
his tradesmen's bills.
He may drive a stage-coach, but he mustn't take or carry coppers.
He may ride a horse as a jockey, but he mustn't exert himself in the
least to get his living.
He must never forget what he owes to himself as a gentleman, but he need
not mind what he owes as a gentleman to his tailor.
He may do anything, or anybody, in fact, within the range of a
gentleman—go through the Insolvent Debtors Court, or turn
billiard-marker; but he must never on any account carry a brown paper
parcel, or appear in the streets without a pair of gloves.
[Illustration:
THE GENEALOGICAL SHIRT.
]
[Illustration]
SHIRTICULTURE.
A new branch of the Fine Arts has lately flourished, which we do not
know how to designate by any better name than SHIRTICULTURE. It is the
art of painting on shirts—an art which cannot fail to go to the bosom of
every one who enters at all into it. It was a favourite maxim of Buffon,
that "_Le style c'est l'homme_." With all due respect to one who dressed
animals in the finest language, we beg to say, that nowadays "_La
chemise c'est l'homme_." The shirt is the man. Depend upon it, that
shortly the particular profession, trade, penchant, or weakness of every
one, will be laid bare to the whole world upon his breast. The gent has
nearest to his heart a ballet-girl; and the sportsman is immediately
detected by the last winner of the Derby peeping through his "Dickey."
The noble game of cricket has been got up on a piece of lawn, no bigger
than your chest; and we have seen Jack Sheppard breaking through a
publican's shirt-front. Rowing matches not unfrequently run down the
back of a river swell; and we know a gentleman who never appears on the
turf without a whole steeple-chase galloping right over him, with a
tremendous hunter jumping over each shoulder. The rage for pictorial
shirts will ultimately spread over everybody in the kingdom. Men of
noble descent will be drawing out their genealogical tree on a square of
fine calico; and admirers of the "Fancy" will be putting their pet
bull-dogs into muslin. We shall have heraldic shirts, theatrical shirts,
military shirts, archæological and antiquarian shirts, temperance and
convivial shirts, and shirts with portraits of puppy-dogs, men, parrots,
and women. We shall have artists in shirts, as we have artists in hair;