“Now,” cries he, “you must take a little of your charming physic,—only a little, respected friend;—there—there!”
“Oh Lord, you will kill me!” cries the doctor.
“Not worth talking of—only what’s usual—doctors always die when they take their own physic. Come, only one last pill:” and so saying, the ruthless Punch runs him through the body with the point of his stick. The doctor dies. Punch, laughing, exclaims, “Now, my good friend, cure yourself if you can.”
[Exit, singing and dancing.
After other adventures, which have almost all the same tragical end, justice is at length awake, and the constable is sent to arrest Punch. He finds him, as usual, in the highest glee, and just busied, as he says, in making music with the help of a dustman’s bell (a very ‘naïf’ confession of the musical capacity of the nation.)
The dialogue is brief and important.[27] It ends with the constable showing Punch the warrant for his arrest: “And,” says Punch, “I have a warrant for you, which I will soon execute.” Hereupon he seizes the bell, which he has held concealed behind him, and gives the constable such a blow on the occiput, that, like his predecessors, he falls lifeless; whereupon Punch springs off with a ‘capriole,’ and is heard singing behind the scenes.
The magistrate, who comes after the death of the constable, has no better fate. At length the hangman, in proper person, lies in wait for Punch, who in his joyous recklessness runs upon him without seeing him. For the first time he seems somewhat embarrassed by this rencontre, is very slightly cast down, and does his best to flatter Mr. Ketch; calls him his old friend, and inquires very particularly after the health of Mistress Ketch. The hangman, however, soon makes him understand that all friendship must now have an end; and sets before him what a bad man he is to have killed so many men, and his wife and child.
“As to them,” says he, “they were my own property, and ’tis hard if a man may not do what he likes with his own.” “And why did you kill the poor doctor, who came to help you?” “Only in self-defence, good Mr. Ketch; he wanted me to take his medicine.”
But all excuses and evasions are useless. Three or four men spring forward and bind Punch, whom Ketch leads to prison.
In the next scene we behold him at the back of the stage, trying to look out from behind an iron grating, and rubbing his long nose against the bars. He is very wroth and miserable, yet, according to his use and wont, sings a song to drive away time. Mr. Ketch enters, and with the assistance of his helpers erects a gallows before the prison-door. Punch becomes sorrowful, but, instead of feeling repentance, has only a fit of greater fondness and longing for his Polly. He however mans himself again, and makes various ‘bon mots’ on the handsome gallows, which he compares to a tree planted, as it seems, for the adornment of his prospect. “How beautiful it will be when it bears fruit!” cries he.