And the generous Aristocracy who admired him.
In the same year Punch, with malicious inventiveness, represented Queen Victoria in the act of unveiling a great statue to Shakespeare on Shakespeare Cliff, adding as her epitaph: "She rarely went to the Italian Opera and she raised a statue to Shakespeare." In these agilities The Times again proved a useful ally, for in the same number we find the following:—
HIGH TREASON
A traitor, who signs himself "Alpha," and writes in The Times, writes thus:—
"It is no use to conceal the fact—British high art is hated at Court, and dreaded by the aristocracy. They don't want it; they can't afford it; they think any art, which does not cultivate their vanity or domestic affections, can have no earthly use!"
We trust that the writer of the above will be immediately committed to the Tower, there, in due season, to be brought to the block.
TRAINING SCHOOL FOR LADIES ABOUT TO APPEAR AT COURT
It was a letter in The Times that again prompted Punch's remonstrance, in July, 1845, against the Queen's preference for French milliners, and an historical contrast is rubbed in by the article on the imaginary "Royal Poetry Books," or didactic poems, for the benefit of the Royal infants, of which two specimens may be quoted:—