“This here’s the poker, about which the Clown says, ‘Would you like something hot?’ Punch says ‘Yes,’ and then the Clown burns Punch’s nose, and sits down on it himself and burns his breeches. Oh, it’s a jolly lark when I shows it. Clown says to Punch, ‘Don’t make a noise, you’ll wake the landlord up.’ The landlord, you see, pretends to be asleep.
“Clown says, ‘You mustn’t hollar.’ ‘No,’ says Punch, ‘I wont;’ and still he hollars all the louder.
“This is Jim Crow: ye see he’s got a chain but he’s lost his watch. He let it fall on Fish-street Hill, the other day, and broke it all to pieces. He’s a nigger. He says, ‘Me like ebery body;’ not ‘every,’ but ‘ebery,’ cos that’s nigger. Instead of Jim Crow we used formerly to show the Grand Turk of Sinoa, called Shallaballah. Sinoa is nowhere, for he’s only a substance yer know. I can’t find Sinoa, although I’ve tried, and thinks it’s at the bottom of the sea where the black fish lays.
“Jim Crow sprung from Rice from America, he brought it over here. Then, ye see, being a novelty, all classes of society is pleased. Everybody liked to hear ‘Jim Crow’ sung, and so we had to do it. The people used to stand round, and I used to take some good money with it too, sir, on Hay-hill. Everybody’s funny now-a-days, and they like comic business. They won’t listen to anything sensible or sentimental, but they wants foolishness. The bigger fool gets the most money. Many people says, ‘What a fool, you must look!’ at that I put my head back. ‘Come on.’ ‘I shan’t. I shall stop a little longer.’
“This is the Ghost, that appears to Punch for destroying his wife and child. She’s the ghost of the two together, or else, by rights, there ought to be a little ghost as well, but we should have such a lot to carry about. But Punch, being surprised at the ghost, falls into exstericks—represented as such. Punch is really terrified, for he trembles like a haspen leaf, cos he never killed his wife. He’s got no eyes and no teeth, and can’t see out of his mouth; or cannot, rather. Them cant words ain’t grammatical. When Punch sees the Ghost he lays down and kicks the bucket, and represents he’s dead.
“The Ghost is very effective, when it comes up very solemn and mournful-like in Romeau and Juliet. I took it from that, yer know: there’s a ghost in that when she comes out of the grave. Punch sits down on his seat and sings his merry song of olden times, and don’t see the Ghost till he gets a tap on the cheek, and then he thinks it’s somebody else; instead of that, when he turns round, he’s most terrible alarmed, putting his arms up and out. The drum goes very shaky when the Ghost comes up. A little bit of ‘The Dead March in Saul,’ or ‘Home, sweet Home:’ anything like that, slow. We none on us likes to be hurried to the grave.
“I now takes up the Doctor. This is the Doctor that cures all sick maids and says, ‘Taste of my drugs before you die, you’ll say they are well made.’ The Doctor always wears a white ermine wig: rabbit skin wouldn’t do, we can’t go so common as that; it’s most costly, cos it was made for him.
“After the Ghost has appeared Punch falls down, and calls loudly for the Doctor, and offers 50,000l. for one; then the Doctor feels his pulse and says, ‘Very unfortunate misfortune! I have forgot my spectacles, cos I never had none. I can see all through it—the man’s not dead.’
“The Doctor gives Punch physic. That’s stick-lickerish wot he subscribes for him; but Punch don’t like it, though it’s a capital subscription for a cure for the head-ache. (I dare say, Mr. Mayhew, sir, you thinks me a very funny fellow.) Punch tries to pay the Doctor back with his own physic, but he misses him every time. Doctors don’t like to take their own stuff anyhow.
“This is the Publican as Punch steals the sausages from; he used to be the Grand Turk of Senoa, or Shallaballah, afore the fashion changed—for a new world always wants new things: the people are like babies, they must have a fresh toy ye know, and every day is a new day that we never seed before.—There’s a moral for you; it’ll make a beautiful book when you comes to have the morals explained. Ye see you might still fancy Punch was the Grand Turk, for he’s got his moustaches still; but they’re getting so fashionable that even the publicans wears ’em, so it don’t matter.