There never has been any change in Punch and Judy from the time it was brought to England from Italy. The fun is now, as then, in Punch knocking Judy on the head with his stick, and the shrieks of Judy with an expression on her face of enjoyment. That is all there is of it, and all there ever has been. And singular as it may seem, it is the first amusement of an English boy, and it delights him till he dies. He enjoyed it at eight, and just the same at eighty. No doubt he has a vague idea that he will find a Punch and Judy show in heaven when he reaches it.
But Punch and Judy shows are not all the amusements of the great city. Garden hose not being common, owing to the fewness of gardens and the limited use of water, the hand organ flourishes in all its native ferocity, the grinders being, as over the water, Italian noblemen with their wives. And they are just as dirty and grimy here as there. The mixed brass and string banditti perambulate the streets making the day and early night hideous, and in the side streets where the policeman is infrequent the street juggler plies his vocation.
THE MAGIC PURSE.
MUSICAL NUISANCES.
One, for instance, has a common purse with four shillings. He places the four shillings in the purse, the country yokel sees them placed therein, and he chinks the purse. So far as the countrymen’s eyes and ears go there can be no doubt as to the fact of the four shillings being in the purse. Then the fakir offers to sell the purse to the countryman for sixpence, which, were the shillings actually inside, would certainly be a bargain. The countryman pays the sixpence, and straightway opens the purse, but he does not find the sixpence therein. It is as empty as his head. He finds that he has paid sixpence for a purse dear at a penny, and he retires amid the jeers of the populace.